Sunday, October 14, 2012

Austin City Limits Music Festival 2012, Day 2

Day 2 of the ACL Festival can best be described as...wet. Shortly after I arrived, there was a huge downpour of rain. I had brought an umbrella and poncho, but I was really hoping the rain would stop. I know some of these younger kids revel in the rain by dancing and sliding in the mud, but I'm too old for that crap.

So...I lucked out. The rain stopped at around 6pm and it didn't rain again for the rest of the night.

 The only band I really wanted to see Saturday night was Neil Young & Crazy Horse. His performance started at 8pm. There was another performer, "Gotye", who was performing at 7pm that I considered watching. He's got a current hit single called "Somebody that I Used to Know" that I think is pretty good. But..that's the only song that I know. If I had watched his performance, I would have been stuck at the very back of the crowd for Neil Young. One thing I learned from these ACL festivals is that if you want to get close to the stage, you have to get over there at least one hour before the band is scheduled to come on. The longer you wait, the farther back you will be. Neil Young had the priority that night.

                                 (NEIL YOUNG)

 Neil didn't disappoint either. When he plays with Crazy Horse, he is in an entirely different stratosphere. His performance rocked harder than just about any other rock band half his age that was playing at ACL. There were several songs running nearly 15 to 20 minutes where half of that time was just FEEDBACK. I think only Neil can turn 10 minutes of feedback into an artform.

                              (KISHI BASHI)

Over these past couple of days, I have also learned the limitations of my iPhone camera and came to the conclusion that it sucks. I'll occasionally get a good picture out of it, but it's capabilities are too limited and the video recorder is awful (there is no zooming capability unless you download an additional app, and even then it's still not good). I was hoping the iPhone camera would be better than my current, 8 year old Nikon, but it's not. They both suck. So, I guess it's time to spring for a new camera.

                                (PUNCH BROTHERS)

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