I went to visit Alisha and Brad in Austin, Texas last weekend. It was the weekend of the ACLFest (Austin City Limits Festival). I will blog about the time with them in another blog. I took so many pictures, I had to split them up!
130 bands, eight stages, three days.
Here I am at the main entrance. It's my first time! This was the 7th year for ACLFest.
Here's the top of the "info" station.
This is looking towards the AT&T stage with the skyline in the background. How cool!
All weekend long, you saw people carrying around a bag for cans and bottles. You got a free t-shirt when you filled one up. "Keep Austin Weird" is one of the slogans, Keep Austin Green should be another. There were barely any chain restaurants anywhere in the city. During the festival, instead of the vendors you see at other festivals in their little trailers, ACL hosts local restaurants. It's called A Taste of Austin. Each restaurant has a few choices from their regular menu. It was great food!
Friday:
Here I am sampling some BBQ brisket! Yum! It's bigger in Texas.
Saturday:
This was a group called Band of Heathens. They all had their own bands, but would fill in for one another when band members were missing. Soon they created their own sound and joined together to create the one band. They were from Austin.
We hung out at the Austin Kiddie Limits tent with Maddy. (who's birthday was also on Saturday. When I asked her, on Friday, what tomorrow was, she replied, "ACLFest." I had to prompt her to tell me it was her birthday. She knows what's important!) This was the Q Brothers. The brother in the sleeveless shirt is the bass drummer from the movie "Drumline". They were fun!
Here's a group that I had read about in the program, Yonder Mountain String Band. They played at the small tent. It turns out, they were awesome!
Saturday was the hottest day of the three. The temperature was in the 90's the entire time I was there. (I came back to 50 degree weather!) We took a dip in Barton Springs where the water temperature is 68 all year round! I am exlaiming that it wasn't cold. Not compared to Lake Superior, which at it's warmest is only 50 some degrees! I really wasn't cold at all! I was prepared for chilly water, but it was most refreshing!
Saturday evening for dinner I tried the sloppy nachos. They were smothered in cheese and beef! Delicious!
Sunday:
Alisha and I sat and listened to the South Austin Jug Band. Another local band, much like the Yonder Mountain String band, but no jug! They were great! We walked over to hear the Raconteurs, but ended up coming back to SAJB because we liked their style of music better. (The Raconteurs were screaming when we walked over to hear their "music".)
While Alisha and Brad sat over in Austin Kiddie Limits listening to the Jimmies again (we heard them Saturday) Anil, Scott and I headed over to the AMD stage and listened to Gillian Welch and David Rawlings. We were about to head back to the Kiddie tent to hear Nicole Atkins, when Gillian said she had a special guest (they did this quite often during the festival) so we waited to find out who it was. It was Alison Krauss. They sang "Go to Sleep Little Babe" from "O Brother Where Art Thou". It was great! The entire audience started clapping along.
Here is Nicole Atkins over at Austin Kiddie Limits. She said we were the most attentive audience she had ever had, which also made us the most terrifying. We were giving her our full attention. It was also the most crowded that tent had been!
The Sunday night headliner/festival closer was the Foo Fighters. There was no other band (like Friday and Saturday nights) so EVERYONE was over at the AT&T stage (I wouldn't mind a new phone for all this free advertising I'm giving AT&T!). We were about a quarter of a mile away from the stage. It was crazy! But fun!
Alisha and me posing for a photo shot!
It was also very dusty! The first day I wore flip flops and my feet got a little dirty. We decided we didn't get sunburned because the dust was a natural sunblock!
Look for my post about Austin!
No comments:
Post a Comment