By Kayla Farr | Reporter
Friday through Sunday wrapped up the 15th anniversary of the Austin City Limits music festival in Austin.
Austin’s Zilker park held eight stages. The gates opened at 11 a.m. each day, but the peak hours for arrival fell between 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. For people who love music, there was a lot to listen to; for those who only had a few artists they wanted to see, there was still food to eat, places to lounge and lots of art to see. I was told to dress comfortably for the heat and wear sensible shoes. During the weekend, I averaged almost 20,000 steps a day.
On Friday, which was day one, Die Antwoord, a rap group from South Africa performed. Their music included lots of electronic influences. Flume was definitely one of my top three favorite sets because their music is a mix between pop and electronic. The first half of their set was mostly deeper album cuts; however, the second half was amazing because they got the crowd’s energy up with some of their more popular songs. Finally, my friends and I went to Major Lazer which featured an attention-capturing light show. Finally, we saw headed over to Radiohead; hearing “Creep” live was one of the best parts of the evening.
On day two, I found out that DJ Mustard, known as the DJ in the song “In my Room,” sounds much better on the radio; his transitions between songs were choppy and didn’t sound good. Everyone at Schoolboy Q’s set was hyped to hear “Collared Greens;” he got the whole crowd involved. Overall, Cage the Elephant was a great set for those who knew their songs. The lead singer, Matthew Schultz, crowd surfed, and one of the guitarists broke his bass on the stage at the end of the show. Two Door Cinema Club was another one of the performers on Saturday. They are known for the hit single “What You Know” and their debut album, “Tourist History.” However, we left early to hear Chainsmokers just as they were playing “Closer.” Finally, Kendrick Lamar finished off the night with his remarkable performance; he played lots of songs from one of his darker albums, “To Pimp a Butterfly.”
On the final day of ACL weekend 2, Bob Moses did a phenomenal job during his performance by playing the crowd’s favorites which included “Tearing Me Up” and “Too Much is Never Enough.” Willie Nelson was also a big performer of the weekend; Nelson’s crowd covered almost half of the park and included parents, children and older attendees. Before heading back to Waco, we concluded the weekend with Porter Robinson and Madeon which included a phenomenal light show and new music, making it a memorable performance.
Overall, the best performance was Cage the Elephant, they had a great energy and played some of my favorite songs. The worst performance was DJ Mustard; he had good songs, but the transitions between ruined his set. The biggest surprise was Die Antwoord because they had a great sound. Willie Nelson was my biggest letdown because of the large crowd; too many families brought their screaming children, and I couldn’t really hear the music.
Overall, the festival was well worth the money and blisters on my feet. ACL, I will be seeing you next year.
