The Austin City Limits Music Festival is a three day annual festival held in Austin, Texas at Zilker Park. This year was the festival's ten year anniversary and it most certainly lived up to its years past. ACL Fest is put on by the Austin-based entertainment group, C3 Presents, who also curate Lollapalooza in Grant Park, Chicago. Over 70,000 attendees fly in from all over the world to enjoy this weekend of music, food and arts. There are eight different sponsored stages by well-known companies such as Bud Light, Honda, and the performing rights organization, BMI. ACL Fest was just recently approved to add a second weekend for 2013.
Austin City Council Approves Second Weekend for ACL
Prior to ACL the city of Austin is overtaken by those wanting to participate in all that the festival has to offer leading up to the fun-filled weekend. Clothing companies, magazines, non-profit organizations, etc. pour into town to host weekday shows and parties, building hype around the main event. Many official ACL acts choose to perform at these pre-events in order to create anticipation for their set during the festival.
This was my first time experiencing ACL and it was quite the busy week. The first event I attended was Gary Clark Jr.'s performance at Stubb's to benefit the Waller Creek Conservancy on Wednesday, October 10th. This environmental organization preserves and maintains Waller Creek and its surrounding parks. Gary Clark Jr. is an Austin native and was the perfect candidate to perform in order to bring attention to this important local cause. This was the second time I had seen GCJ in concert, and once again, he did not disappoint. He is one of the few true musicians of our time; an amazing songwriter, guitar player and singer... A modern day Jimi Hendrix if you will.
Gary Clark Inaugural Benefit Concert
The following night I attended my second event which was the TOMS Shoes World Sight Day Awareness Party at Symphony Square featuring Kishi Bashi, Vacationer and Tennis. This event was to benefit those suffering from a cataract. The artist who created the cover of The Beatles Yellow Submarine created the promotional poster for the event and was there signing; of course with my luck I had two people in front of me in line when they ran out of posters. But the event was very nicely done and all three performances were stellar with a completely amazing light show on the building behind them as they sang. I had never been inside Symphony Square before and it is by far one of my new most favorite spaces in Austin. Hopefully we will get it as an official venue for SXSW this year!
Following this event I went straight to the longtime established blues venue Antone's to catch Atlanta based psych punk band, The Black Lips. I moved to Austin from Atlanta a little over a year ago so it was great to get a taste of home. The Black Lips always put on a highly energetic show, but watch yourself or you're sure to get an elbow to the face!
Friday rolled around and the festival had finally begun with the first performance at 11:15am. People filled the streets making their way to Zilker Park from all over the city. My office at SXSW shut its doors at 3pm so that employees could enjoy the festival. Unfortunately I encountered several issues getting to the festival, so I was only able to catch a few songs from French electronic duo M83 and about half of The Black Keys show before I bailed to get food. Half of the Keys duo, Patrick Carney, was actually at the TOMS event I'd been at the night before. You can imagine my shock when I turned around and he was standing right behind me sipping on a drink! For all that you (and I) missed, here's a recap:
ACL Friday Highlights
As disappointed as I was at missing most of Friday, I attended an ACL Night Show at Emo's featuring the electro-inspired band Polica and indie alternative group Metric. I had seen Polica once before at the Belmont for their performance at the Dell party during Interactive Week at SXSW 2012. Lead singer Channy Leaneagh has one of the most haunting voices I have ever heard. I became obsessed with their self-titled debut album but previously questioned as to whether or not she would sound live as she does on the record. She has officially proved to me twice that answer is an absolute yes. They are by far one of the best new bands out there right now. I was equally excited to finally see Metric, a band that very rarely tours. They mainly focused on performing songs from their most recent release, Synthetica, but also performed tracks off their past albums such as "Gold Guns Girls" and "Dead Disco." Their energy was palpable and it was one of the best combo shows I have seen in quite some time.
I was down at Zilker Park Saturday by 1pm to catch goth rocker Zola Jesus and English indie alters Bombay Bicycle Club. I kept the UK fever alive by catching half of Dry the River's performance then I moved on to the synth-pop group, Gardens & Villa. One of my favorite performances of the day by far was Father John Misty, better known as Joshua Tillman, the previous drummer of Fleet Foxes. If you do not yet have his latest album, Fear Fun, download it immediately. I looped around to catch a few Metric songs for the second time, then got caught in the rain at Michael Kiwanuka, putting me under a tent that was right next to the Big Gigantic performance. The rain prevented me from catching much of Band of Skulls, which was a disappointment, but I did get there in time to hear their growly single, "The Devil Takes Care Of His Own." The rain finally cleared at this point and I traveled over to the Bud Light stage to catch The Roots. Much to my surprise, just when I thought I wasn't going to see this instrument twice in one month, they were showcasing a sousaphone player! I have to say all and all that this show was one of my top three performances of the weekend. They absolutely killed it. I am happy to say that I can now cross this band off my list of must-sees. Anyone who doubted this late 80s hip-hop fusion group, I'm here to tell you that they've still got it! I then moved on to Bassnectar, something I was reluctant to attend in the first place. And my opinion still stands; I really don't understand this dubstep DJ phenomenon. I respect it, but I don't understand it. Thankfully it wasn't long till the wildly talented Jack White took the stage, ripping it up with songs from his new solo album, Blunderbuss, as well as tunes from his White Stripes days. Here's a recap of Saturday night:
ACL Saturday Highlights
Post festival I ventured to the American Legion House for the Maxim after party featuring Bombay Bicycle Club and white girl rapper, Dev. BBC was great, again, but Dev... Hmmm... Have I mentioned that I HATE white rappers? She was awful. I'll leave it at that.
Sunday was actually the lineup I was looking most forward to, but unfortunately homework and errands did not allow me to enjoy as much of it as I would have liked. I arrived at Zilker around 2:30pm and headed straight to see three-piece folk rock band The Devil Makes Three. I grew up playing the standup bass so Lucia Turino is a little bit of a musical hero to me. After their performance I went to see Polica again and was pleasantly surprised to hear new material during their ACL set, as they only played songs from their debut album Friday night. I left Polica early to get a front row spot for indie alternative supergroup, Bad Books, which is comprised of Brooklyn based solo artist Kevin Devine and members from Manchester Orchestra. They had just released their second album, II, days earlier so I was totally stoked to hear the new material live. Almost tied with The Roots, that was one of my top shows of the weekend. I traveled over to see Irish indie pop-rockers Two Door Cinema Club then caught a few songs off of The Lumineers set before calling it a day. Recapping of Sunday:
ACL Sunday Highlights
I have to say there were several acts that I was very sad to have missed this weekend including Wild Belle, Florence + The Machine, Neil Young & Crazy Horse, The Boxer Rebellion, alt-J, Crystal Castles and most of all, Iggy & the Stooges. There's just not enough hours in the day! But overall my first ACL was definitely something to be remembered and I look forward to attending next year as an experienced veteran.
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