With a DJ by

After chilling at the Bahia Mar’s lobby while listening to some awesome, drunken karaoke performances, we headed out to Louie’s Backyard for the Cartel show. But unfortunately, we made it a tad bit late due to the lack of parking. (Leave it to us to miss the only band that starts on schedule. Every other act seems to be going on stage at least an hour later than scheduled.) We speculated that the large crowd called for an on-time performance. Luckily, we made it in time to hear the band play one of the best covers of Oasis’ “Wonderwall” I’ve heard. Louie’s was packed and I think it was due to an energetic band along with perfect Spring Break weather. Seriously, last night was probably the most beautiful weather we’ve had since the week’s beginning. Check out our Cartel photo gallery.

We decided to stop by Inkredible Tattoo and Piercing to see if any Spring Breakers had decided to commemorate their Spring Break romance with a tattoo. The place was buzzing with business as customers waited anxiously to get their new ink done. We met up with a woman named Sophia who was no stranger to tattoos. She flashed us what she called a “Blue Bird of Heaven” on her right shoulder and collarbone. The fresh ink was the most painful she had ever received and was still covered in Vaseline. We also followed Shane who was covering his left shoulder with a tribal tattoo.

A tattoo artist also dished about talking one Spring Breaker out of getting a girl’s name across his chest — a girl he had just met hours before. Another artist talked about a 7-hour tattoo session worth a whopping $1000. Video of Shane’s session, Sophia’s tattoos and tattoo artist confessions should be up in our videos section soon.

It seems like the splitting up of Texas week has affected the party at South Padre Island. Even the Sheraton’s security staff complained to us about the lack of college kids. Apparently, the popular hotel only had 60 percent occupancy as opposed to the “no vacancy” status from last year. Still, we made our way to the beach side to get a few snapshots of the Spring Breakers that were there. But the security dudes were right, there weren’t that many to be found. One group of gals, even stopped to ask us where everyone was. “Where’s the party at?” they griped. The almost empty beaches may be the result of a few thousand hangovers. After all, Spring Breakers need to rest up before heading out to tonight’s Cartel show at Louie’s Backyard and Tequila Frog’s Maxim Party.

Our search for Vanilla Ice continued and we decided to hit up Chaos to see if we could get a few photos of the rapper in party mode. As we made our way inside, we finally realized the reason for the long wait. The place was like a Girls Gone Wild DVD. Let’s just say yesterday’s bikini contest at Louie’s Backyard was a bottle of O’Doul’s and Chaos was a bottle of tequila. This clearly was where the party was at.

The DJ spun DJ Unk and Flo-Rida tunes and Spring Break gals worked it on the main balcony. The crowd below whipped out their camera phones to take home the titillating memories. Finally, after much anticipation, the MC introduced the man of the night. Vanilla took the stage and taunted the crowd as groupies tried to get a piece of the Ice. But, unfortunately, the impromptu performance we had hoped for did not come. Instead, we got Bobby Banhart, also known as, “the guy that dumped Tila Tequila.” That’s right, the reality show star partied it up on South Padre Island as well and we’ve got the photos to prove

The Inertia Pool Party at The Radisson was supposed to be a torturous event. Apparently, one of the Viva La Bam guys that is not Bam Margera was scheduled to make an appearance. But the Jackass was nowhere to be found — at least not while we were there. Nevertheless, Spring Breakers trickled into the pool area and Budweiser girls mingled and gave away free caps and nifty little pocket flashlights. (We found them useful when searching for batteries in our camera bags.) The DJ spun club hits as the crowd gathered in and around the pool with drinks in hand. But the party had just begun. Check out our Inertia Pool Party gallery.

The V247 was lucky enough to get a chance to meet London band The Switches at Pelican West. After a few phone calls, we were able to secure an interview with the brit-pop band. We didn’t know much about them except for the fact that they were British and sounded a bit like Franz Ferdinand. So when we sat down for an on-camera interview, we were happy to discover that they were some of the funniest, laid-back, charming, British rockers we’ve ever come across. The band joked with us about their influences, their new album “Lay Down the Law” and their hero, David Bowie. Check out the interview for yourself. Afterwards, band members –Matt Bishop, the lead vocalist, bassist Thom Kirkpatrick, guitarist Ollie Thomas and drummer Steve Godfrey — took the stage in front of a small crowd. The group ripped through a set of their energetic pop-rock anthems. Check out our Switches photo gallery.

We headed to the Bahia Mar hoping to get some photos and a glimpse of rap legend Vanilla Ice, but by the time we got there, it was over. On our way to the performance area on Bahia Mar’s beachside, a drunken Vanilla groupie slurred a “Yo guys! Vanilla’s in our condo playin’ a guitar” at us and we knew we were too late. Our Vanilla Ice experienced turned into one that included being hustled by a drunken DJ who couldn’t seem to tell us more about Vanilla or his whereabouts. “The cops are trying to tear this place apart” he griped. But sadly, no Ice in sight. Rumor has it he’s headed to Club Chaos tonight. We’ll keep you updated on our Iceman quest. Stay tuned!

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Photo courtesy of www.Wikia.com