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ACL Festival
October 2, 2008
ACL 2009 dates: Oct 2- 4
ACL Fest will rock you in October next year, C3 Presents confirmed today. Right after they finally got lucky in September.
No word yet on whether Radiohead is available, or that they’ll even still be relevant Oct. 2- 4.
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October 1, 2008
And the best selling artists at the Waterloo booth during ACL are....
(No album titles are used, so we’re not sure which records sold, just that this particular artist sold the following number of CDs during the festival
MGMT 239
Vampire Weekend 212
Back Door Slam 149
Jenny Lewis 143
Fleet Foxes 141
Alison Krauss & Robert Plant 130
Manu Chao 118
Electric Touch 103
Jamie Lidell 92
What Made Milwaukee… 90
Abigail Washburn 86
Rodney Crowell 82
Nicole Atkins 82
Raconteurs 80
Okkervil River 80
Xavier Rudd 77
Black and White Years 76
Gogol Bordello 72
Conor Oberst 66
Eli Young Band 65
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September 30, 2008
'FNL' on ACL
So we’re kicking ourselves for not thinking of this idea: Whitney Pastorek of Entertainment Weekly asked cast members from “Friday Night Lights” to review sets at last weekend’s ACL Fest. Check them out.
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ACL takeover- Full Service
Check out Full Service, playing on the grass near Jack In the Box during ACL. The Austin band has specialized in “takeovers” since they shadowed 311 and Snoop Dogg this summer.
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September 29, 2008
ACL aftershow review: Conor Oberst, M. Ward and Jenny Lewis
M. Ward took the stage first to start off Conor Oberst’s aftershow at La Zona Rosa around 10 p.m Sunday, without the high-powered band that accompanied him during his Friday set at the festival. Ward is just as good solo as he is with his band, however, as the big sound of his finger-picking style compensates for the lack of umph. He played a few repeats from his Friday set, including, “Sad, Sad Song” and “Chinese Translation,” before bringing out Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, who appeared at the festival on Sunday. Rawlings and Ward traded licks and Welch sang backup on Ward’s “Fuel For Fire,” a mellow cover of “It Hurts Me Too” and Ward’s “One Life Away” to finish the set.
Lewis came out second. Her performance on Friday in the WaMu tent was good, but inside La Zona Rosa the show was bigger and better. Lewis and her band played mostly the same set as they did at the festival, starting off with “Jack Killed Mom” and “Rise Up With Fists.” Lewis’ chemistry with the rest of the band is one of her strong suits, as when she trades verses with guitarist Jonathan Rice on songs such as “Carpetbaggers.” The onstage collaboration of Ward’s set continued when Gillian Welch and David Rawlings made their second appearance of the evening to sing with the band on “Acid Tongue,” and later when Ward joined the band on “Pretty Bird.”
The crowd seemed fairly worn out by the time Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band came on after midnight, and Oberst joked that he “only thought he was going to die like three times” over the weekend. The set was more varied than Saturday night’s at the festival, with three different members of the band providing lead vocals at different points. In addition to songs off Oberst’s recently released self-titled album, such as “Moab,” “Get-Well-Cards” and “NYC-Gone, Gone,” the band offered up a bluesy cover of “Corrina, Corrina” with Jenny Lewis guitarist Blake Mills joining them on stage, as well as a fun cover of Paul Simon’s “Kodachrome,” which they also did on Saturday.
After finishing the set with “I Don’t Want To Die (In The Hospital),” Oberst returned to the stage with M. Ward for “Lenders in the Temple,” Ward’s “O’brien/o’brien’s Nocturne,” and “Smoke Without Fire” and a couple others before bringing out, you guessed it, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings. It was nearly 2 a.m. by the time the four closed with a cover of Lucinda Williams’ “Sharp Cutting Wings (Song to a Poet).”
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ACL aftershow review: The Black Keys
The ACL fest was in no hurry to die Sunday night, with hardly a place to stand in the yard at Stubb’s for the popular aftershow by the Black Keys.
After an opening Black Angels set that featured a two-song guest spot by Roky Erickson, concertgoers might have hoped for a bit of ACL synchronicity in which fest performer and “Attack & Release” producer Danger Mouse would make an appearance; he didn’t, though his Gnarls Barkley bandmate Cee-Lo Green was up in the VIP balcony for the whole show.
Instead, the band from Akron stuck to the basics: Heavy, loud garage blues in which singer and guitarist Dan Auerbach stalked one square of the stage while drummer Patrick Carney pounded away beside him on a kit decorated with a fake tiger-skin rug. Barely interacting with the crowd and allowing for little of “Attack & Release’s” sonic space (a cover of Captain Beefheart’s “I’m Glad” was among the few calm moments), the two-man group churned through a vigorous but slightly monotonous set.
Highlights included the new song “Strange Days” and older ones like “Everywhere I Go,” but the crowd seemed equally pleased by everything, bringing them back after an hour-long set for a short encore that included “Psychotic Girl.”
Photo: Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN
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ACL review: The Kills
Here’s a little tip: Texas, even in the fall, is pretty hot.
No great revelation I know, but it’s one London duo the Kills were unaware of heading into their early afternoon set Sunday and they weren’t shy about sharing their discomfort with the still-appreciative crowd.
Dressed in black (hello?) singer/guitarist Alison Mosshart and Jamie Hince (guitar/vocals) started the day off with the tantalizing slink of “U.R.A. Fever,” from the band’s latest album, “Midnight Boom.”
Started in 2002 as a menacing garage blooz/doom pop outfit backed by a well-stocked sampler, the Kills have added glints of sunshine into their studio output in the years since. But in the Lonestar sun that good cheer was gone Sunday, with the duo’s guitars tangling like serpents against the clatter and bang on the sampler.
“We’ve never played a show in the sun before,” Mosshart said early on. “This was a terrible idea,” Hince lamented later.
Clearly this is music not made for sunlight, but at least all that angst and discomfort got manifested into the music and helped songs that are really pretty rudimentary gain a more dangerous edge.
“The bottoms of my feet are burning. So are the tops,” Mosshart laughingly shared after the relative calm of “Sour Cherry” as the sun warmed to somewhere in the mid 80s.
It was fun to humor them this time, but what would they have done in the hot dustbowl of ACL 2005? Stay in the smoky clubs, you two.
But thanks for trying.
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ACL review: Against Me!
Was that too soon?
Sorry, let’s move on.
Point is Against Me! found themselves at the front of the pack creatively after last year’s across-the-board winner “New Wave.” For their next trick, they’re trying to link up their earlier, less-nuanced output with fans inducted in the wake of the band’s newfound success.
It looks like they’re two for two based on their performance Sunday afternoon, blasting through anthems new and old without losing the sizable crowd one bit.
It was interesting to note throughout that even though many of the songs on “New Wave” such as “Stop!” or the title cut contain production touches and embellishments not found on many punk records, they stood just as strong when played stripped down, fast and loud like the older material, including “Cliche Guevara.”
Energetic and workmanlike the entire way — drummer Warren Oakes is in the running for the honor of most outwardly happy musician anywhere — that energy easily bled into the songs and let them shine.
The sweetest moment came when Tegan Quin of folk duo Tegan and Sara (also playing the festival) appeared on stage to accompany lead singer Tom Gabel on the swaying ballad “Borne on the FM Waves of the Heart.” The song, which features Quin on record as well, is one of the prettiest passages in the band’s catalog. Does that mean soon we’ll hear Against Me! blending folk-pop into its musical mix. Crazy as it sounds, at this point if they try it I wouldn’t bet against them.
Photo: Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN
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ACL review: Band of Horses
There are about a dozen things to nitpick with Band of Horses and the Seattle band’s set Sunday night.
Their songs routinely go on for about a minute too long and then the band doesn’t really know how to end them; most songs are generally one or two choruses and a verses repeated over and over; main cog Ben Bridwell (guitar/vocals) isn’t what you would call a strong singer and bass player Rob Hampton sounded like mud for roughly half the set.
You get the idea.
But here’s the thing, in spite of all that it’s pretty much impossible to not fall in love with this band and its more melodic if less experimental take on My Morning Jacket’s indie-roots rock. For all the missteps there were enough strengths — Bridwell’s raw emotion and honesty, the ability to pack three guitars into pop-like songs without sounding overstuffed — that the band’s after-dark set was a winner from the first notes of “The First Song,” from 2006’s “Everything All The Time.”
Loud, majestic and austere for pretty much the entire 60 minutes, Bridwell and his five-piece band played for the heavens and came within a few stars of reaching them on roaring gems like “The Great Salt Lake” and the celebratory (of course) “Weed Party,” among others.
Even if, as noted above, Bridwell’s voice isn’t technically sound, he’s got the strange ability to sound multi-tracked live and create thrilling harmonies that (to these ears) far surpass the supposed greatness of the pretty but lightweight Fleet Foxes.
It was all on display when the first notes of the almost-hit “The Funeral” teetered out of the speakers and Bridwell and company hammered it home for nearly six minutes. Afterward, Bridwell marveled at his place on stage and simply told the crowd, “I love you, you look beautiful!” and repeated a sentiment he shared after nearly every song.
For the vast majority of the thousands assembled, the feeling was mutual.
Photo: Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN)
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September 28, 2008
ACL review: Foo Fighters
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ACL review: Shooter Jennings
Shooter Jennings was 10 minutes late for his show in the WaMu tent Sunday evening. And when he finally did show up, the shaggy-haired, free-spirited son of Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter took the stage as loudspeakers played the Darth Vadar march music from “Star Wars.”
I had the feeling, right then, that something strange was bound to happen.
But no: Jennings and his band went straight to work, churning out a string of hard-driving, high-testosterone, country-ROCK songs — “Steady at the Wheel,” “Slow Train,” “This Ol’ Wheel” — that touched on themes of alienation and a quest for freedom and the dream of going home. Newbies like me were reminded, very quickly, that the 29-year-old Jennings and his guitar-driven band share more of a musical kinship with Lynyrd Skynyrd (or the old Black Sabbath) than his father Waylon. And that’s quite all right. “The Wolf,” his third CD, reflects the spirit of a man whose committed to making music his own way.
Halfway through the show, Jennings sought to soften the mood a bit as the stage hands brought out an electronic keyboard — an instrument that didn’t seem to be working very well, it turns out. Jennings gave it a try for a couple of tunes. Then, following “Higher,” the stage hands returned to fix it. Shooter shooed them away. “I’m trying to get through one more song with this son of a … ,” he said, clearly frustrated.
Launching into a new song, Jennings played only a few notes before exclaiming, “What the hell is wrong with this thing?” Then he stood up at center stage, lifted the keyboard from its stand and threw it down to the floor. “Change of plan,” he said dryly.
Let the record show that Jennings promptly strapped on his Gibson guitar and ripped off an inspired rendition of “Daddy’s Farm” and eventually closed the show with a high-energy cover of the Arc Angels’ “Living in a Dream.”
Photo: Jack Plunkett ASSOCIATED PRESS
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ACL review: Mike Farris and the Roseland Rhythm Review
Recovering alcoholic Mike Farris has come home to God — and along the way, this one-time bad boy of the 1990s independent rock scene has developed an unabashed love for “black church music.” Hallelujah, Brother Farris. Hallelujah.
No doubt about it: Farris’ hand-clapping, foot-stomping, raise-the-roof Gospel-and-Soul set in the WaMu tent Sunday afternoon was an ACL Festival highlight. Imagine a blue-eyed soul singer and a Stax-style horn section at a tent revival, and you get the idea. Farris and his 10-piece band had the crowd in his hand from the moment he launched into Thomas A. Dorsey’s Gospel classic “Precious Lord, Take My Hand” and held them through a 10-song set that drew almost entirely from his acclaimed album, “Salvation In Lights.”
It was a lot of fun, especially when nationally renowned gospel singers Ann and Regina McCrary got revved up and jumped into the mix. But make no mistake: Farris’ musical intent is quite sophisticated. He’ll take a classic gospel tune like “Can’t No Grave Hold My Body Down” and splash it oh so tastefully with soul and blues colors. At the same time, he’ll write original songs — such as “I’m Gonna Get There,” which closed the set — that mix gospel and soul, and the theme of salvation, in a way that makes them seem of the same family as those gospel standards. Easy to conceptualize, but very hard to pull off.
Farris received an extended standing ovation midway through his set for his stirring cover of Sam Cooke’s “Change is Gonna Come” — and man, did he earn it. Farris delivered the song as testimony, backed by the suggestion of a church organ, bringing to it a rare physical force as he clenched his fist and shouted out with conviction, yes, yes, a change is gonna come. He went the opposite way with “Oh Mary, Don’t You Weep,” slowing it down a bit, giving it some reflective accents, and inviting a horn section solo (featuring Austin’s John Mills, Tony Campisi and Michael Mordecai) that suggested a New Orleans funeral march.
“The beauty of these old songs is that at the point of despair, (they connect) to our need to believe in a better day,” Farris said before a delicate cover of “Trouble in This World.” “That’s why songs like this are as relevant today as they were 150 years ago.”
Photo: Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN
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ACL review: Kevin Fowler
I always thought the answer to the old question about what the dog would do when he finally caught the bus could be summed up in two words: “Kevin Fowler.”
Fowler may not be the most well known figure in country-rock, though he rules in that insular sub-genre that dubs itself “Texas Music.” But he inspires fan loyalty to a cult-like degree, he conducts his career according to his own road map and, most importantly from a fan perspective, he gives every appearance of having more fun than any 19 or 20 given barrels of monkeys.
Fowler came to his pre-eminence by a circuitous route. The Amarillo native first came to the attention of Austin audiences as a long-haired, head-banging member of the metal band Dangerous Toys. Now he has a buzzcut and a cowboy hat, but Fowler still knows how to wring a Les Paul dry (as evidenced by his dead-on rendition of Aerosmith’s “Sweet Emotion”). The crowd in front of the Austin Ventures stage on Sunday night responded accordingly.
More to the point, he is a clever and incisive writer who can craft a lyric with wicked acuity (“Beer, Bait and Ammo” and “Lord Loves the Drinkin’ Man,” to cite but two examples). He may be content to play the Bubba to the hilt (if he had bellowed, “Can I get a hell yeah?!” one more time, I was ready to put out a bounty on him), but he has a savvy appreciation for how far his persona can carry him. He gives the impression of being able to recreate himself at any time and still make valid and engaging music in the process.
In the meantime, he’s found a groove that works. As the old joke goes, the more you drink, the better he sounds. What Elsie the Cow is to milk, Fowler is to Jim Beam and Crown Royal, as songs like “Lord Loves the Drinkin’ Man,” “Triple Crown” (“…a double ain’t enough when I’m feeling this down”), “Loose, Loud and Crazy” and “Ain’t Drinking Anymore” (“…but I ain’t drinking any less”) all attest.
Fowler has never met a honky-tonk he didn’t like (outdoor festivals included) and Sunday night at the Austin Ventures stage, it was clear the feeling was mutual.
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ACL review: Neko Case
A surprisingly small crowd was on hand to see sometime New Pornographer Neko Case at 4:30 p.m. Sunday on the AMD Stage. Case and her band have been touring on her successful 2006 release “Fox Confessor Brings the Flood” for two and a half years, and this was their last show of the tour. According to her Web site, she has a new album coming in 2009, and she played a few new songs at ACL.
The lack of interest in her performance may have been because Case’s music is fairly mellow, especially for a festival setting. This isn’t the Racontuers, or even the New Pornographers. Regardless, her voice is beautiful and it was on display in crowd-pleasers off “Fox Confessor” such as “Margaret vs. Pauline,” “Hold On, Hold On” and “Maybe Sparrow.” The new material was mostly in the same vain as “Fox Confessor,” abstract country tunes that allow her vocals to shine.
Other highlights included “I Wish I Was The Moon” from her self-titled 2002 release and an emotional cover of Harry Nilsson’s “Don’t Forget Me,” which she said will appear on the new album. Case also offered up some amusing banter to the crowd, and closed the set with the romping “John Saw That Number,” also from “Fox Confessor.”
Photo: Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN
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ACL review: Okkervil River
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ACL review: The Belleville Outfit
The Belleville Outfit, one of Austin’s premier acoustic bands, raised a lot of smiles from the BMI Stage on Sunday afternoon with a cheerful and sophisticated set grounded in gypsy jazz, finely crafted vocal harmonies and a dozen different flavors of swing. Hey, who said it was hot out here? Once the Belleville sextet hit the stage, the musical spirit was nothing but cool and breezy.
The Belleville Outfit is fronted by songwriters Phoebe Hunt (violin and vocals) and Rob Teter (guitar and vocals), but it’s clear that they are a band of equals who are terrific listeners. The audience picked up on it, too, cheering the solos not so much as the band’s deft tempo changes and their keen sense of time. When pianist Connor Forsyth locks in with Hunt’s violin on “Caroline” or guitarist Marshall Hood locks in with her on “Wandrin,” it’s musical beauty of the highest order.
Sensing that their 6-month-old debut album might not seem brand new to many Austinites in the crowd, the Belleville Outfit took advantage of their first ACL gig to debut seven new songs. They opened the show with Teter’s “Let Me Go,” a swinging, crooner’s blues that sounded as if it could have been written by one of the band’s great inspirations, the late Walter Hyatt. A few minutes later, Hunt trotted out “Time to Stand,” a deep and delicate tune of reflection that showed off the band’s affinity for both Appalachian and bayou imagery. On “Nothing’s Too good for My Baby,” Hunt summoned the spirit of Anita O’Day. Special guest Warren Hood (Marshall’s cousin, and son of the late Champ Hood) joined the band on the last two tunes of the set, “Sunday Morning I’m Always Missing You” and “Oh Babe.”
Photo: Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN
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ACL review: Heartless Bastards/White Denim
It would be hard to find two Austin-based, indie-identified bands with more different ways of looking at the way you write, arrange and execute rock music than these two acts, who played back-to-back at the Austin Ventures stage Sunday evening, Heartless Bastards at 5:15 and White Denim at 6:30.
Lead Bastard Erika Wennestrom recently moved here from Ohio, rebooting her band in the process and recording a new recor dwith producer Mike McCarthy (Spoon, Trail of Dead).
While the early comparisons to PJ Harvey seem unfortunate if inevitable, fans seem to have settled into the idea that she won’t be the American PJ we deserve. If anything, her voice is more in the ragged Joplin tradition than Harvey’s artsy howl. The band’s songs are blocky affairs, garage rock in theory but not really in practice. This isn’t spirit of ’66, Beatle boot revivalism, but ruggedly simple rock that didn’t seem to mind that its songs never quite distinguished themselves from one another.
Of course, White Denim’s didn’t either, but they went the other direction entirely. Packed with guitarist James Petralli’s triumphant, quick-change riffs the Austin trio produced high energy grooves that that dissolved into rhythmic vamps, reminding one of nothing so much as a stripped down Mars Volta, such was its complexity and detail. Joshua Block is a mesmerizing drummer, a hard hitting, hard swinging master of the frantic slam and the deft change-up.
You would have had a tough time finding a band that looked happier to be on stage (Petralli’s grin is worthy of a toothpaste ad) or a band that exploded out of the gate so forcefully. I could have watched them stretch those high velocity explorations for another 45 minutes.
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Scene report: Thoughts on fest
A few quick thoughts on the fest in general:
- Favorite acts: David Byrne, Hot Chip, Erykah Badu, Sharon Jones, Spiritualized, Band of Horses
- Favorite set from an Austin band: White Denim
- Sorry I missed: N.E.R.D., Jamie Lidell and The Mars Volta
- Not worth the time: Stars
- Favorite peripheral ACL event: The dance party the Daily Juice on Barton Springs pulled off Saturday night (and apparently Sunday, as well) with people dancing on the roof and in the streets en masse to the music of DJ Richard Gear before police very politely pulled the plug at 11 p.m.
- Most annoying time: High school kids shoving their way out of Band of Horses set to get a spot for Foo Fighters
- Best food court yet
- Unfortunate: No Mexican beer for the crowd. Heineken, Bud Light and whatever else they had didn’t seem to be strong enough options.
- Best weather of any fest. That alone makes it probably my favorite fest yet.
- Great idea by organizers to let people fill recycling bags in exchange for swag. The park was super clean, all things considered.
- No major calamities, see: fire, last-minute pull-outs
- Yes, there was some dust, but it was nothing like the year of the dust storm. Look, it’s a park: There is dirt and some withered grass. There will be some dust.
- With the exception of one or two sets, the sound bleeding was kept to a minimum. I didn’t really have any set ruined by bleeding.
- Maybe it was just me: The bass at the Dell stage was way overdone, and muddled the sound a bit from certain vantage points.
- Obvious alert: Appreciation for the sound and the sets is largely dependent on where you stand. Further back in front of a speaker is better than a little closer and to the side.
- Cool that there were stations to refill your water bottle. Even if it’s just 92 degrees, you gotta stay hydrated.
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Scene report: Neko Case
After a somewhat boring set from Montreal-based Stars, the festival kicked it up a notch with Against Me! providing some punk-rock energy to a slow early afternoon. As Silversun Pickups took the stage at one end of the field determined to bring some raw energy to the day, alt-country chantuese Neko Case brought more raw emotion and beauty than energy.
I was curious as to whether her atmospheric vocals would hold up on the massive stage in front of thousands under the hot sun, but she and her band were up to the task.
Case played songs spanning her critically acclaimed solo career. Her beautiful vocals, while not inspiring the audience to dance — or really move at all — seemed like the perfect antidote for a crowd that looked like it needed a respite from an exhausting weekend. And there’s probably no more soothing a voice to rush over you like a cool breeze on a languid summer day.
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Scene report: Out-of-towners
One of the best parts of ACL Fest is the far-flung crowds it draws. On Sunday, a few out-of-towners took a moment to talk about their festival experiences.
Olga Martinez of Poland flew in with a group of friends to see Beck, Foo Fighters and Slightly Stoopid, but they’ve enjoyed other aspects of Austin as well.
“Barton Springs, the river, was really fun,” Martinez said before heading off in search of more music.
Lauren Perkins of Houston drove to Austin to catch Mars Volta, Tegan and Sara and the Kills, but she’s enjoyed more than just the music.
“The pedicab ride was really fun,” she said. “We liked our driver. He was the best part.”
Heather Walker recently moved to Austin from Los Angeles.
“I don’t really consider myself a native yet,” she said. “I’m here for The Kills and Tegan and Sara.”
Walker’s friend, Jacqueline Garrett of Columbus, Ohio, came to ACL Fest to see Erykah Badu and Beck, but has also been getting a taste of the larger Austin culture.
“We went to Sixth Street last night, but we’re going to try South Congress tonight,” she said. “I’m not a big fan of all those jello shots and all that bumping and grinding.”
For Liz Lambert and Matt Harp of New Orleans, it’s all about the music.
“Conor Oberst was really good,” Lambert said.
“We also enjoyed Beck,” Harp said. “It’s really been all about the festival.”
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ACL review: Gillian Welch
Gillian Welch forgot to put goop on her hair. It was a fact that caused her much chagrin as she stood on the breezy expanse of the AMD stage. “I didn’t want to eat my hair while I was trying to sing,” she explained.
Actually, the wind-tousled look suited Welch, who — though she was born in Manhattan and grew up in L.A. — always looks like she just stepped out of a Depression-era Dorothea Lange photograph (and whose music sounds as though she were providing the soundtrack for James Agee’s “Let Us Now Praise Famous Men”).
Welch and her longtime partner, David Rawlings, delivered an unplugged set that mixed material from her four albums with songs from a forthcoming project. And the performances were fine; it was the venue that rankled.
This marks the third time this weekend that this listener has seen a small-bore acoustic act presented in the cavernous expanse of one of the festival’s main stages. Performances that should breath intimacy and beckon listeners closer are swallowed up by the brobdingnagian scale of the stage. Surely, one of the smaller stages would be more appropriate for Welch’s understated musical portraits.
And so much for that. Welch and Rawlings have such an intuitive and finely honed sense of the sound and (more important) the feel of classic American acoustic music that more than once a song this listener thought must have come from a Library of Congress field recording (like “Sweet Tooth”) turned out to be a Welch/Rawlings original.
Other songs, like ”Knuckleball Catcher” and “The Way We Will Be” (two more new ones) had a more contemporary feel without seeming trendy, but Welch classics like “Orphan Girl” and “Red Clay Halo” retain a timeless sound.
Certainly, from the fans’ point of view, the big treat of the set came when Alison Krauss (enjoying a busman’s holiday after her show with Robert Plant last night) joined Welch and Rawlings for a reprise of “Didn’t Leave Nobody But the Baby,” the song they recorded for “O Brother, Where Art Thou” (Rawlings got to sing Emmylou Harris’ part). As moments of pure, unadulterated musical magic go, it was hard to top.
Photo: Erich Schlegel FOR AMERICAN-STATESMAN
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Scene report: medical tent numbers
Friday at ACL, 114 people were treated at the medical tent, while 197 were treated Saturday. Three were transported to the hospital Friday, with 13, including two suspected drug overdoses, getting an ambulance ride Saturday.
The numbers may seem high, but they’re down from previous years, according South West Emergency Action Team (S.W.E.A.T.) supervisor Tannifer Ayres. “People are doing a better job of keeping themselves hydrated,” she said.
Heat-related causes accounted for 28 percent of those treated Saturday, followed by 26 percent for lacerations and 19 percent for asthma/respiratory problems. Only 7 percent - 13 fans- were seen for eye irritations due to dust.
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ACL review: AA Bondy
When Alabama’s AA Bondy took the Dell Stage with nothing more than an acoustic guitar slung over his shoulder and a harmonica fastened to his neck, the booming echoes of drumsets from other stages threatened to drown out his expertly finger-picked licks.
Bondy moved confidently through his Dylanesque folk tunes nonetheless, keeping the crowd’s chatter to a minimum and their response enthusiastic.
“I kind of feel like I should be out there among you,” he said a few songs in.
But he had no reason to worry about the performance lacking intimacy. The audience was transfixed by the Southwestern crunch of his slightly distorted acoustic riffs and the graceful imperfection of his crackling melodies.
The music was punctuated by his haunting revivalist poetics. Over the dreary drag of the minor chords in “Rapture (Sweet Rapture)” Bondy sang about trees swinging like hanging men, while in the upbeat romp “Vice Rag” he asked Jesus to take his sinner’s hand after singing that he’d drink dry an ocean full of whiskey.
Though Bondy has only released one album, 2007’s “American Hearts,” he played a surprisingly small number of cuts from it. The rest of the set was made up of equally impressive unreleased numbers. In one, he picked out a sunny, gospel-like progression while singing, “Dress well/Get pretty/You got to die.”
Judging from the strength of such songs, Bondy’s next album will be just as good or better than “American Hearts.”
Photo: Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN
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ACL review: Abigail Washburn and the Sparrow Quartet
OK, here’s the deal: One of the great bluegrass maestros of the age teams up with a young woman who sings Chinese folk songs — in Chinese. They hook up with an A-list cello player and fiddlers, and set out to play string band music that mixes Appalachian melodies with Eastern pentatonic scales. Are you with me so far?
If all that sounds off-putting or intimidating, rest assured that in the hands of Abigail Washburn and the Sparrow Quartet, it is anything but. Washburn, along with banjo virtuoso Bela Fleck, cellist Ben Sollee and fiddler Casey Driessen, provided a beguiling start to a musical Sunday as they wove their peculiar multicultural tapestry on the AT&T Stage.
Washburn fell in love with China and its people during a journey to the People’s Republic in 1996, so much so she learned to speak the language and decipher the folk songs of Sichuan and other provinces. Moreover, she began to link Chinese folk music traditions to those of her own country.
Thus, the Sparrow Quartet, a group that can go from the delicate calligraphy brushstokes of a subtle Eastern melody to a full-on bluegrass breakdown at the drop of a fingerpick.
Washburn’s set began with a stately overture that segued into her own “A Fuller Wine,” followed by a hot jazz turn on Blind Willie Johnson’s “Nobody’s Fault But Mine,” which yielded to a Chinese tune that allowed Fleck to pop the clutch and blaze away.
If that kind of eclectic versatility sounds daunting to the average listener, onstage it came across as anything but. The four musicians shared an easy rapport both among themselves and with the audience. “This song is called ‘Kangding Qingge’,” said Washburn, introducing yet another Chinese tune, “but we like to call it ‘Old Timey Dance Party.” At another point, a Kazakh folk melody transformed itself into an vintage rave-up called “Banjo-Pickin’ Girl” that Washburn made her own (“I’m goin’ to North Carolina and from there off to China,” she sang). And an austere, classical sounding string quartet instrumental resolved itself into a formal reading of the Beatles’ “Eleanor Rigby,” which in turn gave way to a fiery duel of solos between Fleck and Driessen.
It was all…well, it was fun. And fascinating. And a journey in and of itself. For a few minutes, the ACL festival felt truly worldwide.
Photo: Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN
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Scene report: VIP action up
Last week Charlie Walker of C3 said the demand for VIP amenities is the fastest growing aspect of ACL. “Some people don’t care about the higher price point,” Walker said. “They just don’t want to be hassled. Hundreds paid $850 for such services as massages, spa treatments, gourmet organic food and free drinks, all in the shade of the VIP Grove. There’s also access to an Internet lounge and clean restrooms. With four VIP wristbands, you also get coveted parking.
After this year’s pleasant weather and when the new dust-busting irrigation system is put in at Zilker (C3 has pledged $2.5 million to the project, among other park improvements), the VIP section may lose much of its allure.
That would be a good problem to have.
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ACL review: Swell Season aftershow at the Paramount
When I interviewed her last year, singer/pianist and “Once” co-star Marketa Irglova claimed that a touring musician’s life was not for her, and that she’d return to a quieter one when movie promotion was finished. But an Oscar (for best original song) can change things, and the shy singer was a committed performer this Saturday at the Paramount — even offering new songs, occasionally taking the stage by herself, and trying to cope with shouted comments from a concertgoer who wanted to call her his girlfriend.
Co-star and Swell Season bandmate Glen Hansard was more comfortable with the crowd’s boisterous love, clearly relishing stateside success after years of trying to break through with his longtime band the Frames. (He did some Frames material, like “Fitzcarraldo” and “What Happens When the Heart Just Stops,” here.) Starting the show like the busker he played in the film — by himself with no mike or guitar amp, playing the song that sets “Once” in motion — he was the evening’s engine, frequently delivering cloudbursts of vocal emotion that would make Coldplay’s Chris Martin hide in a corner.
As if to prove they were more than a one-hit act, they played their Oscar song “Falling Slowly” up front, then kept listeners rapt through a two-hour set that stretched well beyond the movie’s soundtrack, even including one of the best Daniel Johnston covers (“Life in Vain”) this side of Kathy McCarty. All signs (including the presence of a fleshed-out band backing the two stars) suggested this could be the start, not the culmination, of a fruitful career.
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