My sinuses are clogged with dust and grass. My eyes are still filmy and fuzzy. My neck is sore (thanks Metallica!). My ankles are sore (thanks Chvrches!). My left ear has a nice constant ringing.
But was it all worth it? Absolutely. Saw some great music and spent some good times with friends. Also saw some really poorly done music that was disappointing, and missed out on a bunch of stuff I wish I could have seen, but let's focus on the good here.
Transportation:
- Saturday, we decided to go with Lyft the whole time and see how that worked out. $17 to get from my house to the Crown & Anchor for lunch and football games, then $13 to get from there to the park. Afterwards, we walked up the hill to Deep Eddy to have a beer and wait for the surge pricing to die down (and Deep Eddy was totally packed, which wasn't cool) and then paid $24 to get back up to north Austin. So, definitely cheaper to just pay to park somewhere close to the Fest, but also nice to not even worry about having to drive.
- Sunday, my buddy and I did the free bus shuttle from downtown. Yet again, getting on and off was quick and super easy. I thought it would be miserable, but actually very convenient.
Food:
- Went back to the empanada stand again, despite knowing full well that they wouldn't be good, and received the same dry meal as last time. I just hate waiting in the lines, so I go to the short lines and end up with dry empanadas.
- Was also disappointed in the Mighty Cone. The issue is the tortilla - just a bad, cold, dry flour tortilla. The chicken was good, and the slaw was tasty, but the tortilla blows. Which is crazy, we have so many places that make legit tortillas here, how can this still be a problem.
- Peached Tortilla's bahn mi tacos were super good.
- Taco Deli's fundido tacos were also just as good at the park as they are in the store. Dang yummy, and they had a thing of the Dona sauce to drown them in. Yummo.
Tunes:
- Reignwolf. Totally awesome show. He did crazy stuff with his guitar that made me rethink how an electric guitar is played. Like doing chunks of the show one-handed while using his other hand for a drum stick or the microphone. Or playing the guitar like it was a stand up bass. Wild, but damn good rock and roll.
- Alvvays. Another good show, I loved it all over again. Just sparkling and bright pop rock tunes played well.
- David Byrne. I'm still annoyed that my friend split up from me to go see Sir Sly instead, but this show was fabulous. He did the same deal as last week, with the grey suits and the big band of people jamming out around him, and its so great to have someone who planned out an entire show, with costumes and choreography and forethought - instead of 90% the bands who just step out onto the stage and play their tunes while the light show does all the work. Byrne is amazing.
- Manchester Orchestra. Also awesome. Much harder than I expected from listening to their tunes beforehand, they threw down a legit grunge-tinged rock and roll show. The crowd was super into it as well, which always helps.
- Brockhampton. Third time to see these guys in the past week, and while it was another good show of high energy and fun tunes, I don't need to see them again for a little while. All three shows were almost exactly the same, down to them asking the crowd if everyone is OK like 20 times per show. YES, DAMMIT, WE'RE OK! But their tunes are highly fun to jam to in a crowd. Good stuff.
- Paul McCartney. Another insanely good show. I can't stress enough how fun it is to hear Paul freaking McCartney sing some of the greatest pop songs of all time. And the whole crowd, just happily singing along to classics like "Blackbird" and "Can't Buy Me Love." And Paul was funny up there, kind of mugging for the people and yelling back at them and just kind of playing along. Still awesome on the bass, the guitar, and the piano. So glad I got to experience that twice.
- The Wombats. Better than expected. I knew I'd like the Joy Division song, but they really brought a lot of energy and excitement to the early portion of the day.
- The Breeders. OK. I kind of wish I had bopped over to catch Japanese Breakfast instead. They sounded good, but I'm just not that into their new album.
- Brandi Carlile. I am so bummed out that Highly Suspect cancelled their show at the last minute because of some injury in the band. SO BUMMED. But, it meant that I could go see this great show instead, after multiple people had told me that she was a must see. It was a very good show. Her own music is lovely, and as usual I got nice and uncomfortably damp in the eyes during "The Joke," but then at the end of the show she brought out Pearl Jam's Mike McCready to jam on some Led Zeppelin, and it was AWESOME.
- Chvrches. This might have been my favorite show of the whole weekend. We ended up very close, like 5 people back from the barrier, and so we were right in the mix of people who loved these songs and were pumped to be there. Which always amps up the excitement of the show, when the folks around you know every word and are ready to jam out. They played everything I wanted to hear, sounded great, and it just clicked perfectly. Awesome show.
- Metallica. Another top notch show, with a great (but not perfect) setlist of the hits (I would have liked to have heard "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)" and "Fuel"), and all of the dudes in the band still absolutely rule at their jobs (we're going to act like the attempt to cover "Whiskey River" never happened). My neck is still legitimately sore, two days later, from the uncontrollable need to thrash around during those songs. I'm ready to do it again!
- Parquet Courts. Surprisingly great. I could have used a little less yelling in the vocals, but the music underlying the songs was super fun and well-done. I've become a fan.
- X Ambassadors. Meh. Their crowd was GIGANTIC, like shockingly large, but we stayed way over to the side to have a beer and hear a little bit of this. It wasn't terrible, but wasn't anything I'd go out of my way to try to hear again.
- Shawn Mendes. Shockingly good. I mean, the guy can really sing, and he definitely knew how to work the crowd and get the girls screaming. Crazy part to me was how many older (like 25-ish) ladies were also screaming their heads off and dancing. Some of the slow songs were pretty lame - although I know they aren't aimed at my loins - but when he played the faster songs or the hits, it was pretty fun.
- Arctic Monkeys. I'm still super confused about what these guys are trying to do. Is it a purposeful attempt to drive people away from loving their music? They opened the set with one of the yawn-tastic new tunes, and then did the same when they came back for the encore later on. I mean, talk about letting the air out of a crowd. I can't think of another headliner I've been to at ACL that had that many people walking out during the show, it was a pretty constant stream coming past me (I was center stage, about 100 feet back, in one of the big mud puddles in front of the sound stage). However, I will readily admit that hearing "Arabella" and "R U Mine?" and "I Bet That You Look Good on the Dance Floor" ruled. Those parts were extremely good and fun. I just don't understand what is wrong with making a whole show be good and fun instead of only little slices in between boring funeral lounge music.
I'm exhausted all over again just going back through it all. A lot of new cool experiences and good memories from another weekend in the Park. Now I need to go take a nap and clear my sinuses.
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