AUSTIN, Texas (by Greg Barr) - Remember the name Kyle Riabko. This 17-year-old white kid from, of all places, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, apparently has the ghosts of super freakster Rick James and guitar slinger Stevie Ray Vaughan fighting for control of his mind and body.

Playing acoustic guitar and accompanied only by a drummer, Riabko did much more than fill up a room Friday at a BBQ party thrown by Canadian organizers of the South by Southwest music conference's more polite cousin in Toronto, North by Northeast.

Riabko already has much of his own style to go along with his natural talent. You can't fake soul, and Riabko has a shitload. Absolutely shredding all kinds of funky riffs on his acoustic guitar and with a voice that sounds years older, the kid even tossed a few lines for effect from Michael Jackson's Thriller into the mix.

Riabko has been signed to Columbia (watch for his debut CD in April-May) and this month has been doing some dates in the U.S. opening for The Wallflowers. Record label and industry reps who are in the audience grooving along to his music tell me that Riabko is incredibly grounded for a teenager and has a very savvy manager. He'll need both assets to avoid being used and spit out by an industry that no longer wants to invest in artists for the long term.

From there, here's a quick snapshot of the rest of my night at SXSW:

Next up I head over to see another Canadian, Jim Bryson, who is kicking off the No Depression magazine showcase. Bryson was mainly in town to play guitar and keyboards behind fellow Ottawa singer Kathleen Edwards who has just released her second CD, Back to Me, but judging by the huge crowd at his gig - Edwards herself had been hyping the show to anyone who would listen the past two days - there's a good chance Bryson could soon get the buzz that Edwards had back in 2003 when the SXSW gurus picked her as a major breakout artist.

His roadhouse meets the heartland rock, accompanied by extremely intelligent and poignant lyrics certainly isn't the kind of crap that fills up commercial rock radio in North America. He needs all the help he can get.

Next, I drive to south Austin where my own band is playing a quick set. Sorry, this ain't about me. At 11 p.m. after our short set we stop for a quick beer at the infamous Horseshoe Lounge, and then it's back over to the main drag on Sixth Street for more SXSW. First, we're lured into a club by the infectious dance beats of Lederhosen Lucil, who dresses like Heidi with an accompanying fake blonde wig with pigtails and speaks with a Bavarian accent but is actually from Montreal.

Accompanied by a bassist and drummer dressed like college computer geeks whom she addresses as her Nerds, Lucil has heads bobbing to her insanely captivating beats and her classically trained keyboard chops as she playfully alternates lyrics in English, German and French. One of the funniest moments of the night comes when a dude wearing one of those beer-can helmets jumps up onto the stage through an open window on the street behind Lucil and poses behind her.

From there we stagger up the street to check out some very ill rappers from Vancouver (it seems the Canadians have taken over SXSW this year) called Josh Martinez and Sleep are the Chicharones (think Beastie Boys on Red Bull) and finally end up near 2 a.m. Saturday morning at the Hard Rock Café, where Austin's own Vallejo - kind of like the younger nephews of Santana who blend in elements of metal, punk and tons of energy - are tearing it up. Sure, Los Lonely Boys get all the ink down here - and won a Grammy Award this year - but I have to say this: Vallejo has been doing it better and for much longer. "Thanks to coming to Austin," one of the Vallejo brothers says as the set winds down, "the best city in the USA." On this night, I'm not arguing with that.