A lot more sun, a lot more dirt, a lot less beer and a ton more water on day two of Austin City Limits. Honestly, today was a down day musically. I missed the Old 97′s and José González (both, scheduled way too early). MGMT was too far off to really hear properly, Man Man was intriguing in a Tom Waits ripoff kinda way but odd for odd’s sake only goes so far. John Fogerty sounded exactly like he did the last time we went to see him play. The Black Keys tore shit up but objectively my musical subconscious just keeps classifying them as the new Bearded White Stripes. When The Raconteurs are playing tomorrow I can’t get too excited about the BWS tonight. Beck just looked uphappy to be playing, stumbling, forgetting lines, turning away from the microphone before he finished lines. And not particularly cool dude, to cut the set fifteen minutes short and refuse to come back for an encore. Some artists are just better in the studio.
The attendance today had to be way higher than yesterday – it was nearly impossible to move around without getting lost in a swarm of people going who knows where and getting to and from venues (see the video below for the kind of crowd I’m talking about). Also, it was dusty dusty dusty, cattle stampede levels of dirt in the air. Tomorrow I may bite the bullet and employ the “sit down between the two best stages and wait for them to come to me” strategy.
