Austin City Limits Music Festival

A television program began airing on PBS in Austin in 1976 that aimed to highlight the music in the area. The self-professed World's Live Music Capital, Austin had many different genres and off genre music being supported by fans. In 2002, the city of Austin decided to financially back a music festival put together by the producers of the Austin City Limits show, naming it, not surprisingly, Austin City Limits Music Festival. Like South-By, or SXSW, in March, the acronym ACL is acceptable in normal speech to reference the show, though ACL fest is used plenty as well.

The ACL fest is, like SXSW, an international event, but ACL is only a music festival (hence the name?) and doesn't screen films or try to get distributors for said films, it's music only. It appears to be one of the biggest annual events in the industry for musicians, as Austin is one of the music capitals in America. Other music cities (besides LA and NY) would be Athens, Georgia (New Austin), Atlanta (for hip-hop), and Nashville (for country and bluegrass).

In any case, Corrie and I finally were able to get our good friends from New York, Marc and Linda, a suitable wedding present. They flew out to visit us on their own dime, but we got their ACL tickets and I cooked for them for most of their visit.

I knew a few of the bands, but only from hearing them on the radio at work at my morning job. A few out of sixty over three days amounts to an open mind, maybe? We went to only one day, Saturday.

The fest is held at Zilker Park, just across the river from downtown Austin, in quite a beautiful setting. There were three major stages, and four other less major stages, and at high points, music was being played on all three majors, without interruption, which is neat. Major acts generally don't play simultaneously, usually starting a half hour later and on another stage, giving fans enough time to walk.

I've got some pictures...here are Corrie, Linda, and Marc at the south entrance.



Here's a shot of the Austin skyline, taken early in our day, right after we got there.



Not that you can really tell, but the band on the stage here is Grace Potter and the Nocturnals. The music they played wasn't the same as the music that Corrie has of them, and what they played was pretty great. It was rockin', high energy, and fun. They were described, unfairly I thought at first before I heard them, as Tina Turner singing with the Rolling Stones, a throwback to a rocking band and rocking girlie singer. Turned out that was pretty accurate, and it was a good show.



Later in the day, since we spent all day there, we found the Tent--a tent with a sandy bottom where kids could play and adults could nap, and nap we did.



Another act we saw was Gogol Bordello, a cool gypsy-punk act that puts on a great stage show, and one I mentioned in an earlier post about mustaches.



And, I guess, one last picture of the Austin skyline, around dusk.