Some crankypants Austin American-Statesman columnist took in his first music festival this weekend, when he attended the Austin City Limits Festival, his hometown’s muddy three-day extravaganza that featured Pearl Jam, Dave Matthews Band, and a slew of other bands. Most festival reportage tends to gloss over the hinkiness of events like these—the gradual deterioration of the venues’ PortaPotty army, the dust-flecked food, the shirtless bros who turn their favorite bands’ sets into a campfire singalong—but Ken Herman went right into the mud, and wound up slinging some of his own!

“But as I now understand, festivals like ACL are not really about seeing bands and hearing quality sound. It’s about the experience. It’s about people-watching. It’s a fun experience, though for many of us it was akin to listening to a bad radio during typhoon/typhoid season in Bangladesh.”

And!

“This may be news to the self-professed drunk behind me, but I did not pay $85, endure the ["treated sewage" and yard-trimming cocktail known as] ‘Dillo Dirt’ and pay $25 for parking (split with friends) to hear him on lead vocals during Pearl Jam’s ‘Evenflo.’ Karaoke is not Japanese for concert.”

You know, if you took every bad festival experience I’ve ever had and put them into a column, it would probably read something like this. Not going to lie.


Not sure I buy into all the ooze and ahs over music festival [Austin American-Statesman]
ACL Mud Fest 2009 – Slip ‘N Slide [YouTube]