SXSW 2026: Festival Recap

The festival itself, satellite projects, and surrounding art projects captured the social and political anxiety of the worldwide populace. Messages attempted to find solutions to how humans could communicate better, create more efficiently and optimize our lives. AI was everywhere as people showed off its capabilities and spoke on panels about its role in our collective future, whether we want it to be part of our lives or not.

With 2026’s SXSW being condensed to one week instead of two for the first time ever, it was certainly “action packed”, marking the music, television and film, education and innovation festival’s milestone anniversary. Here are some activities I enjoyed:

German Haus

All Week – at Speakeasy

German Haus was a highlight with its four floors of activities, which showcased the best of German tech and creativity. Located at Speakeasy — right on Congress Avenue between 4th and 5th Streets, in the thick of it all – German Haus was by-far the most popular nation-house with a diverse series of events and open bars and talks about shaping culture and cities.

Stand-out performers included Berlin-based songstresses Rosa Anschütz and Joplyn. Anschütz exhibited a moody, mellifluous yet sharp display of vocal intonations, combined with hard-hitting drums by Kevin Kuhn. Joplyn is a German-Vietnamese-Canadian ethereal solo act on keyboards and voice, singing lyrics like “I’m here to be felt. I’m not here to be followed or unfollowed,” which nod to the hyper state of social media in the U.S. in our current times. Head of the German Music Export Initiative, Neus López, curated a spectacular line-up of musicians to share with the SXSW community.

Circle Six Wrestling

Friday, March 13th – off site at Far Out Lounge in South Austin

One unofficial event gave off tons of raw power and granted the audience the ability to blow off a lot of steam during a festival where people otherwise posture and work hard to sell themselves, their companies, and their products. The “we don’t give a f*ck” spirit of Los Angeles’ Circle 6 Entertainment was contagious.

The night featured about a dozen wrestlers and highlighted recent viral online star Luigi Primo, the “pizza wrestler”, who now has over 200 million Instagram followers. Not bad for a guy who slings dough in Austin, Texas by way of Georgia. Luigi’s opponent that night was the formidable bad-ass Hollywood Haley J who put up a fantastic fight; however, Luigi prevailed in the end after receiving some near-death blows from her (and her dog).

Wrestling fan John Shaughnessy, wearing a “Stone Cold” Steve Austin t-shirt, gave some of his own play-by-play review: “I come out and they’re hitting each other with garbage cans, steel chairs, and throwing each other on the cement. Awesome. The crowd’s lined up around the stage. Wild show without a ring with ‘Violence’ as a chant! Blasting Pantera. Very cool. One wrestler put another wrestler in a trash can and smacked his ass. Like that. Holy shit—they’re moving the location of the wrestling match. It’s a back street brawl! Bar is like a hippie backyard. Apparently someone jumped off a big stage…”

The action was fueled by a live band and a soundtrack that also included blasting Nickelback, Metallica, Limp Bizkit, Papa Roach, Systems of a Down, AC/DC, and Creed, as noted by Shaughnessy.

Riz Ahmed at Impact Lounge

Saturday, March 14th – at Line Hotel

Forty-three year old British actor-slash-rapper Riz Ahmed came over from the UK to discuss his new show, BAIT, on Prime Video, which was released on March 25th.

In the series, Ahmed plays an up-and-coming Pakistani-diaspora Muslim actor named Shah Latif, who works through his mental angst as a small rumor circulates that he’s in the running to be the “next James Bond”. Latifh navigates this news with his boisterous family and his own ego.

Brass Knuckle Blacklot Party

Sunday, March 15th – at an East Austin backlot

Alexis Garcia, co-founder of Brass Knuckle Films, along with Texas-native son, director and composer Robert Rodriguez, threw a memorable bash at their East Austin backlot — replete with smash burgers, Torchy’s Tacos and a lot of ice cream.

Garcia proudly proclaimed, “My favorite part of the party is people’s reactions to the environment and setting. The big Robert fans can feel the energy and recognize props or places. The ones who don’t even know [2019 feature film Alita: Battle Angel] can’t believe how cool it is to have a town in the backlot. It brings out the best in a fiesta.”

Rodriguez played live with his band, Chingon and interspersed production anecdotes between songs. Director Boots Riley, who was in town from California for the world premiere of his latest feature, I Love Boosters, showed up with his family as well as cadres of notable Hollywood and rock music world Who’s Who’s.

The party was also thrown to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Rodriguez-directed vampire horror feature From Dusk Till Dawn, starring Mexican actress Salma Hayek.

The Lumineers (Live)

Monday, March 16th – at Waterloo Park

Bailey Flores, a Central Texas resident who grew up in Odessa in West Texas, has worked as a staff photographer for SXSW for three years. When she’s not on assignments for the festival, she partakes in the events with friends in town and those from the SX crews.

Flores’ favorite part this year was “definitely getting to see the Lumineers! Even though that show was cold, it was a blast to see everyone come out for a free show, whether you were attending SXSW or not.”

The popular alt rock and alt folk band performed for a packed crowd of badge holders and non-paying fans alike — during which front man, Wesley Schultz, walked around the whole audience hi-5-ing fans.

General Reactions to SXSW 2026

Locals and far-away travelers alike found things they enjoyed about SXSW 2026. Todd Remis, of Salem Street Entertainment in Massachusetts, was the Executive Producer of three films at SXSW this year: Bagworm, Joybubbles, and Ugly Cry. To sum up yet another one of his experiences of his SXSW experiences, he said, “SXSW is one of the best festivals to premiere a film, and a festival I try to attend every year, if possible. The combination of the outstanding film curation, the interesting and topical panels along with entertainment industry mentoring meetings hosted, as well as the ability to both reconnect with and meet new filmmakers, plus of course the vibe of the city and the BBQ, all make the trip to Austin extremely worthwhile.”

Saudat Sanui came all the way from the United Kingdom because she is a co-executive producer for the Julia Fox movie, Perfect. Sanui also writes and directs her own material. She gushed about the festival saying, “I’m a filmmaker from London.. and this was my first time at SXSW. My aim was to experience as much of the festival as possible, meet as many people as possible, and also see as much of Austin as possible. These aims were all fulfilled and I had a great time. Highlights included: Congress Avenue Block Party, Historic Scoot Inn, Troublemaker Studios and lunch at the historic Driskill Hotel. It was a brilliant experience!”

Even Governor Gavin Newsom and Jennifer Siebel Newsom showed up from California and checked out the Yamaha Music Innovations pop-up at SXSW.

As many packed up to head back to their respective homes around the US and abroad, the TSA was still shorthanded due a partial U.S. government shutdown – and German airports, trains and buses workers also decided to strike with the Verdi Service Workers Union leading the charge. This resulted in 445 cancelled arrivals and departures, stranding nearly 60,000 travelers. To make matters even worse, ground transportation workers also executed a strike, grinding travel to and from major German cities and their airports to a complete halt, affecting the rest of Europe and the world.

Was it all worth it for a trip to SXSW that took grueling international travel feats and miracles to deliver attendees in time for their sessions and pitches? Shall we see as investor announcements, record and movie distribution deal news starts rolling in and new wrestling stars are minted?

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