ACL 2016: Weekend One From The Crowd

Kicking off some official ACL coverage beyond our social media blitzes from the world. Weekend One was the version of ACL where we get to see bands, spend time with friends and get snarky about the future of America and the music industry.

This gallery will feature some artists, mostly crowd related action and some highlights, calling out Lucy Dacus. Lucy’s set at the BMI stage was great. She and the band were sweet people and we’re fans.

Click through for the shots and a couple of random notes…

Winners: Radiohead were amazing with an asterisk. There was sound bleedover from the dance party up the hill for a good chunk of the performance which sucked from the back of the crowd. If you were like me, in the middle of the sea of music nerds, you were in a trance. It was beautiful.

Die Antwoord created their usual buzz. I shot form the crowd knowing the pit would be closed the next weekend. It was a crazed dance party mixed with WTF is happening? Speaking of dance parties, the LCD Soundsystem set was jam after jam, mostly long format grooves. HITS. All of them. LL Cool J was the throwback performance winner. He did some obscure early songs and montaged the hits. Bayonne won the best of Austin award.

Favorite overall set? Might have to be Two Door Cinema Club. It was energy on energy and while they admitted they wanted to play more new stuff the played “nothing but bangers” from the middle of the set on to close. The new stuff, BTW, revolves around a falsetto and heavy Prince influence, IMHO.

Rainbow. Also, #COYS.

Finally, the new park layout was great. Far fewer bottlenecks and more space where you could get out of the sun. I welcome the change.

Losers: Inflatable couch people have stepped up the annoying game when trying to get in front of the chair line. I mean. Banks and Steelz was not good. I have a fun story about them for Weekend Two. The flushable toilets were a lofty aspiration. There is little go wrong with a porta-potty, so when a few flushables didn’t flush, things got gross. Finally, stop with the mom-jean-shorts. Nope.