Rivalries be damned, droves of OU students skipped Friday classes and even tests to travel to Austin this weekend all because of three little letters: ACL.
They were rewarded for their efforts at Austin City Limits music festival.
“The weather has been perfect,” said University College freshman Patrick McSweeney, shortly after Ted Leo and the Pharmacists’ Sunday morning set, as wispy clouds circled above his head. “2008 was really hot, last year was really muddy, but this year has been perfect.”
Always a critical variable for outdoor music festivals, Texas’s liberal bastion boasted pretty park weather all weekend, another factor that helped sophomore friends Alex Eggleston and Brad Frenette decide to make a weekend out of the trip to Austin.
“I know we’re not supposed to say that, but we love this town,” said Frenette, a history major. “It’s so fun to just walk around.”
Now in its ninth consecutive year, the Austin City Limits boasted its largest attendance to date, upping its ticket sales to facilitate 75,000 patrons in Zilker Park each day this weekend.
“It’s much more crowded,” said energy management senior Allyson Sand. “We heard there were 10,000 more people allowed in this year.”
At $185 for a three-day pass and $85 for each day individually, it certainly leaves one’s pockets light, especially after purchasing food, drinks and band merchandise in the park, plus travel expenses and hotel rooms.
But these students all agreed the financial and time commitment are worthwhile for the shared experience of seeing their favorite bands play.
“I love this,” Frenette said. “Last year, I had so much fun and I had to leave early, so I figured the longer you stay, the more fun you’re going to have and it’s true. Throughout the day, it just gets more fun.”
After Friday performances by The Black Keys, Sonic Youth, Vampire Weekend and closer The Strokes, little Esau Mwamwaya made his way out on to the Budweiser stage and set a high bar noon Saturday. Mwamwaya’s DJ chopped Michael Jackson and M.I.A. songs for the Malawi-born performer to exhibit his happy, infectious delivery while backed by a pair of female dancers who made every effort to keep the crowd dancing in the noontime heat.
Thousands of college students and teenagers flocked to AMD — the other main stage — an hour early to get close to Broken Bells, a side-project pairing James Mercer of The Shins with Gnarls Barkley’s Danger Mouse.
The festival’s highlight came midway through LCD Soundsystem’s hourlong 6:30 p.m. set Saturday, when the unmistakable piano loop from “All My Friends” — the sublime centerpiece of the band’s 2007 record, “Sound of Silver” — began funneling through the speakers and directly into 30,000 sets of ears.
“I wouldn’t trade one stupid decision / for another five years of life,” singer James Murphy shouted into his old-fashioned microphone that he holds like a trucker mouthing a CV radio. The sunlight faded from twilight to near darkness by the end of the eight-minute long track, generating a palpable catharsis within the crowd.
The band later played the raucous punk song “Movement,” which prompted in-sync fist pumping, shouting, jumping and crowd-surfing among listeners.
Deadmau5 (pronounced “dead mouse”) and M.I.A. kept the dance party going Saturday night — the former a Canadian progressive house DJ with an overwhelming light setup and the latter an English-born semi-rapper whose stage screen displayed fiery explosions with every gunshot chorus in “Paper Planes.”
Muse closed out Saturday, slipping into a cover of AC/DC’s “Back in Black” during one of its many otherworldly improvisational jams. It finished with “Knights of Cydonia,” a song as epic as anything from “Lord of the Rings.”
Oklahoma state songwriters the Flaming Lips took the stage at 6 p.m. Sunday shaking the molars of a high-energy crowd with a sludgy, heavy metal take on “Worm Mountain from their recent release, “Embryonic.”
The ever-lovable Wayne Coyne rolled around in his famous space bubble, fired off confetti cannons and rode atop a man in a bear suit, doing whatever it took to rile the sun-baked crowd up for one final Austin City Limits memory.
The National took the nearby Honda stage shortly thereafter and the band bantered back and forth about their view of the Lips’ energetic performance.
“Be careful!” guitarist Bryce Dessner said of the enormous balloon bouncing around above the crowd. “Wayne’s in there!” “He’s puking all over inside it,” singer Matt Berninger added. “Poor bastard.”
The broody Brooklyn quintet trudged through a set full of their best songs, including “Mr. November,” “Bloodbuzz Ohio,” and “Afraid of Everyone.”
Twin brother guitarists Bryce and Aaron Dessner often lifted their instruments above their heads, one blaring distortion while the other punctuated it with soloing.
They dedicated a song to The Eagles, who began shortly before their encore ended, far off in the distance.
As the weekend wound down, students began the scramble to head back to Norman to make up for work neglected.
“I missed a test,” Frenette added. “I have — on Monday morning — two essays due and a retake of a test, which will all be within the same three-hour period.”
He grinned knowingly. “I’m not going to get to sleep tonight.”
Related links:
• For more ACL 2010 coverage, click here
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boomerjack34 1 year, 7 months ago
you couldn't mention a single jam band? Yet, you mention the improvisational "jams" of muse? MUUUUSE! phish was the only headliner you didnt talk about and they arguably had the most fans there. And if your gonna talk about jamming, you have to talk about them. this is sad.....