I made my peace with the eagles, acl 2010
we had bought our 2010 acl tickets early, before they had announced the bands playing. I was all set to sell them like we did last year. but my wife... once she heard the eagles were playing, "#$*% NO! I AM GOING! TO! SEE! THE EAGLES!, we are NOT selling those tickets!" if she had a song, it would be Hotel California. she knew how to sing that song before she even spoke any english. She likes to speak of her days back in Taiwan, she was the singer for a band "thousands of people came to see us play". That band is where she learned to play drums, guitar and heard Hotel California. I saw there was no middle of the road here. we were going to see the eagles.
I remember that I did once buy an eagles album, back when I was in the 7th grade and joined the columbia records club, I got eight tracks. I recall the eagles, cheap trick and the first album by the cars were the selections that actually got some play. but eventually I grew to have less interest in the eagles, I was OK with Joe Walsh though... we saw him on late night with david letterman a few years back, I tried to explain to kat who he was, but it didn't seem to interest her. afterall, he wasn't the eagles... to me he was the coolest eagle.
one of the biggest hassles about acl is the to/from. we worked it out this year. some friends (thanks bill and joy) allowed us to get a bit closer to zilker park by parking our truck in their driveway. from there we rode bikes. only once did I forget the bike lock back at home and had to ride up the hill, load the bike, drive home and start over. roundtrip was less than 30 mins.
a few other people rode bikes as well.
we stayed for the first half of the Kings Go Forth show. some good groove.
this pic of the black keys was taken from a few miles back and about 50k people between us and the stage (distance might be a slight exaggeration). acl was PACKED with people this year and they all wanted to see the black keys. we left this show early but it was not an easy exit. solid walls of people were everywhere.
the highlight of saturday was the monsters of folk, played for nearly two hrs.
the food at acl is not your typical festival/carnival food. on saturday we got our dinner from the lonesome dove bistro. at $8 their tenderloin and wild mushroom skewer is a bargain. with the quality of that meat and portion, I don't see how they can make ends meet. their truffle mac and cheese was also good. the fish sandwich from bess was good too.
flaming lips fans are sort of fanatical about the live shows...
lips frontman wayne did a brief tour in his space bubble after urging us to not push each other and love one another. a girl standing near to me explained "when the lips sing yoshimi, it makes me want to hump on everything and anything". I'm not sure that was what he was talking about, or maybe it was....
ahhh, the old bear ride trick. this was shortly after the band was "born" on stage... emerging from a tunnel of light that had come from the image of a naked dancing girl on the giant LED screen. not a boring moment at a lips show.
standing for hours, in extremely cramped conditions, in the sun... this dude wilted and dropped to the ground. strangers jumped in and offered cold water and after a good sit, he was good as new.... well, maybe not new but he looked as good as he did before he did his weeble/wobble bit.
kat filled three bags with cans and other recyclable materials that people discard on the ground.
silversun pickups were good
this was from the M.O.F. soundboard, there was soundbleed from other stages. notice that it is solid people from one stage to the other. there were two other shows going on during the M.O.F. show
getting from point A to B was not easy, a constant duck and weave through the crowds of people going every which direction.
kat's reward for her recycling effort.
and in the end, I'll admitt the eagles sounded good and they pulled it off like true professionals. I was glad we got three days of acl with only a few gripes or complications. Joe Walsh is still my favorite eagle and kat now recognizes him as an eagle and an individual.
in the end, kat was VERY HAPPY and it was worth all the effort, probably the best acl yet.