Who knew it would come to this? Once a little known escape from blinking Blackberrys and shrill cell phone rings from New York and Los Angeles offices has now blossomed into an industry-meets-the everyman, city-wide festival. Austin's South by Southwest (lovingly acronym'd as SXSW) features over 1,500 acts that have graced your computer screens on blogs and MySpace pages, ranging from indie, hip hop, dance, crunk, spazz, soul, rock, pop to electronica. This year's festival has selected Lou Reed as SXSW 2008's "keynote speaker," who will kick off the festival's panel events (oh, yeah... you can learn stuff here, too!). Along with Reed, comeback heavyweights R.E.M. will be the headlining guest of honor with a nearly impossible to get to show.

Fear not! For those of you more interested in the pay-off of a newfound act, this is the place to be. With music blaring out of every building with a liquor license (and some that don't), your diamond in the rough is only a few blocks away. Last year's festival made the down-and-out, but once polished Amy Winehouse a household name, along with international favorites, like Lily Allen and the Arctic Monkeys. Despite the need for the festival to give you a "hangover kit" (tylenol, instant coffee and a bottle of water) upon check-in, this is the consummate music festival and in a league of it's own. 1, 2, 3... BBQ!