ACL - Day 3

Our last day at ACL. Always a bit sad, but after walking miles and miles the days before I was feeling like someone had beat me up. I haven't been working out much lately (more on that in my next post) and was not used to it. We decided to take it easy this last day since the first person we wanted to see that day was Adele at 1:50. We slept in, took our time getting around and went to eat at Maudie's, which I had always heard was really good. Well, maybe some people would think it was good. I have an ex boyfriend who I used to argue with over enchiladas because he liked cheese enchiladas made with American cheese (ew) and I like cheddar. So we could never agree on a place to eat Mexican. Well, he would have loved these probably. They were made with American cheese, which makes them automatically gross to me. Oh well.

We finished eating and the boys dropped us off close to the park so we wouldn't have to walk the whole way. They were going to meet up later. So we walked over to see Adele and set up our chairs right before it started. Well, a girl came out who was not Adele. Apparently Adele had cancelled a couple days before, we just hadn't heard about it and Adele was still printed in the schedules. Boo! I have decided that British female solo acts are cursed. Last year Amy Winehouse cancelled and this year both Duffy and Adele cancelled. Bad luck.

We were planning to go over to the AT&T stage and get a close spot so we could camp out all day and be close for Foo Fighters that night. I am not a huge Foo Fan, but Jared and Jason were really excited about them, so we got close seats and stuck around to see Flyleaf. I had heard one of their songs on the radio, but didn't know much about them. Amanda and I went over to the AT&T tent where there is air conditioning for a while to cool off. When it was time for Flyleaf to start we walked that way, and as we were walking up the lead singer came out and started singing a praise song. I can't remember it now, but if you go to church ever you would know it. She just sang it a capella and Amanda and I looked at each other in surprise wondering if this was a Christian band. The song I knew played on regular top 40 radio, but I guess they do crossover sometimes so we just said 'ok weird' and had a seat. Well, this is the band that is nominated for the most strange/interesting/weird award from me. After singing a beautiful version of a praise song, the band starts jamming out and they turn out to be like this hard metal type band. Like screaming the lyrics type songs. I really dislike screaming of lyrics most of the time so I was once again in shock. Then she would stop and tell some inspiring story about something that had happened to her and most were spiritual in nature. She even dedicated one song to Jesus Christ - the song I knew from the radio - but again, even this song was a lot harder than it is on the radio even. I mean I guess everyone worships in different ways and more power to her, it was just all very strange.

After Flyleaf, Jason and I walked over to see Against Me!. Now I have always thought if I ever see these guys in concert they better bring it. I mean any band who puts an exclamation point after their name had better be some high energy peeps. I would say they didn't disappoint. It felt really hot this day and we were facing right in to the sun so I definitely was not as high energy as I would have liked to be, but they were all in black and jamming out. I would say good show and would probably have been better if I hadn't been so hot and tired.

After that we stayed at the AT&T stage to see Silversun Pickups. I had never seen them live and liked what I had heard of them, so I was pretty excited to see them. Well, I would like to nominate this band worse show of the festival. I feel like something was wrong with these guys. Like they were on something. They were incoherent and the music sounded awful I thought. We ended up leaving early to get some grub.

Next up was Raconteurs and Gnarls Barkley. Jared and I wanted to see Raconteurs and Jason and Amanda wanted to see Gnarls so we split up. Now, if you don't know who Jack White is, he is a lead singer for Raconteurs and I have a teensy crush on him. So I was really excited to see them. He was supposed to play last year with the White Stripes, but they cancelled last minute. So Jared and I wanted to see as much of them as we could, but we still wanted to get some more food before Foo Fighters and didn't want to not be able to get back to our seats. So we stayed at that show for like 45 minutes and it was great! Poor Jack had like a sort throat and slipped disc in his neck, but he sounded great to me and I really enjoyed this show.

So Jared and I grabbed some food and headed back to our seats to see the Foo Fighters. Now I said earlier I am not a huge FF fan. I do like the songs I know of theirs that have been on the radio, but I couldn't really think of that many and I figured a band like that would play more unknown songs rather than their biggest hits ya know? So I was looking forward to them, but not super duper excited. Ok, well here is my third nomination of the day. Show that I was most suprised that I loved and thought was completely awesome. First, they did play all their hits - and maybe the 'true fans' didn't like that, but I did! I forgot how many songs I like of theirs and I knew all but like one song. Also, Dave Grohl - lead singer - is hilarious and awesome. He talked to the crowd a ton and was really funny and the whole band just seemed so cool. They have a percussionist who was kind enough to do a triangle solo. Haha, yes like the metal triangle. A solo on it. It was funny. They ended up playing like 20 minutes later than they were supposed to and it was still PACKED. Last year for Bob Dylan - nominated for worst show I have ever seen in my LIFE much less ACL - I am pretty sure half the people left by the third song. So this more than made up for that and I had a great great time.

So that was my ACL festival for this year. Overall it was greatness. I hope I get to go next year...again more on that in my next post...