All of the greats were ahead of their time; Archimedes, Nikola Tesla, The Beatles. The Grateful Dead meshed string band music and rhythm & blues to create an entirely new scene and the Rolling Stones carried a rock and roll torch into stadiums and onto television screens worldwide, but in the world of Americana music and Texas’s cosmic outlaw country, there was one group telling old stories and rallying new fans well before those genres even had a name—Asleep at the Wheel.

October came quickly this year, and with it so did ACL Music Festival. There’s something special about the first of the two-weekend music festival.  It was hot. It was sweaty. It was exhausting. But that is to be expected. We, the people, prevailed. Fun was had, regardless of weather by tourists and locals alike. 

About two months ago, the lineup for Austin’s music festival, ACL, was announced to the eagerly awaiting music fans from near and far. ACL makes Austin a popular destination during both weekends of the two-weekend festival.  When there are names like Guns N’ Roses, Mumford & Sons, Tame Impala, and Robyn, amongst many, many more, on the lineup, you’re sure to attract locals and tourists alike.

Austin City Limits Music Festival (ACL) is a fixture in every Austinite’s schedule. Whether it be to leave town and avoid the influx of people and traffic, or to attend the festival either weekend, you can tell when the weekends are coming. Having gone to college in Austin, and attended the festival several times throughout college and after, I’ve found it to be a popular activity with friends, year after year.

About 750 attendees, many fresh off a hot day at the ACL Festival, were treated to an evening of musical and political conversation at the Austin, TX club Emo's last night, highlighted by Jim James, Kam Franklin of The Suffers, and appearances by seven different candidates for office including Austin Mayor Steve Adler.

Austin during Austin City Limits is the best version of Austin. It’s a magical weekend (now, two weekends) where the queso flows like wine and people flock to Zilker Park like the salmon of Capistrana. I swear, even the margaritas taste better. For anyone who has experienced a music festival in Austin, SXSW or FFF, for example, there’s still that buzz in the city. A collective restlessness for live music in all its glory. But there’s a different energy to Austin City Limits.

You know how our dads will turn us green with envy while casually mentioning seeing The Wailers or Led Zeppelin live?  Nope?  That’s just mine?  Well the disappointment and jealous expressions on my future children’s faces was what was playing and re-playing through my mind on Sunday night as Pearl Jam took the stage.

Phantogram’s first song at their 5:00 slot on ACL’s Miller Lite stage was none other than the first song off their new album Voices, dropped earlier this year.  The time slot had to fight with simultaneous performances from Jenny Lewis and Chromeo, but looking at the crowd you wouldn’t have known.

Seeing Interpol live has long since been at the top of my bucket list.  It’s not that I would ever claim to be among the longest or greatest fans, it’s just that they’ve been around forever (to someone born in 1989, being a band since 1997 IS forever!) and I’ve built such a huge reverence for the collection of music, and very specific sound, they’ve cultivated and stayed true to.

#outkast

#outkastACL2014

@outkast

OUTKAST!!!!!!

If you know anyone that attended the festival this year, your social media was probably flooded with these hashtags and retweets about how mind-blowing this show was.  It was so highly-anticipated I feared it wouldn’t live up to the bar everyone from the previous weekend had set.  But at 8:15, they buried my fears.