2005 ACL Fest Home > Reports from the ACL Festival > Archives > 2005 > September > 23 > Entry
It begins
Patrons started lining up around 10:30 a.m. in the increasingly blazing heat. Many of them carried portable folding chairs, umbrellas, blankets and soft coolers and immediately started setting up camp in the shade or near the stages.
Last-minute replacements the Double took the AMD stage at 11:45, subbing for the Ditty Bops. Gerard Cosloy, co-owner of Matador Records, the Double’s label, was in the crowd. “I thought they would be playing in front of nobody,” he said, looking at the small crowd of earlier arrivals. “But this is certainly more than nobody.”
The AMD stage comes with a powerful sound system, the better to carry the Brooklyn band’s fractured pop songs across the field. The peals of feedback and waves of distortion made for a bracing, palate-cleansing start to what was shaping up to be a long, hot day. Singer/bassist David Greenhill’s everyman tenor sailed across the field as he drew on songs from “Loose in the Air,” the band’s new album, and “Palm Fronds,” from 2004. Ending the set with a rumble and wail, the band treated early arrivals to the kind of hip indie rock that there was precious little of at last year’s fest.
Sometimes it pays to show up early, no matter how hot it gets.
Comments
By Roy Waley
October 1, 2005 06:15 PM | Link to this
I hope Wilco plays every year. They always give me an excuse to take a dip in Barton Springs and come back when someone with a pulse is playing. Ideally Wilco would play just before Lyle so I could avoid that stage completely. Two of the most boring shows all weekend.