A Look at Austin City Limits

Gracie Pitman, Staff WriterAfter experiencing the Austin City Limits festival for all its worth, I can confirm that the six hour long car ride from Oklahoma City to Austin is more than worth it. The Austin City Limits festival, also known as ACL, is known to bring people from all across the country to the beautiful city of Austin, Texas. This city alone features various climate conditions. Sprawling green hills, various cacti plants, and the flowing Colorado River all call Austin home. These contrasting conditions live peacefully together, which is one of the awesome reasons that many locals of Austin call their city weird. The festival itself is located within Ziekler Park, a sprawling venue that can hold tens of thousands of people. The six stages were all placed strategically apart from each other, as to block out the music from other stages in case they are featuring artists at the same time. The park looked much smaller than it was however, as the thousands of people filled up the space in a compact manner. The close atmosphere added to the excitement of the festival, and the rush of running from one stage to another in hopes of getting a good spot was incomparable. ACL stood out in many ways, but the most memorable two ways were the music and the food.Every day of the festival brought different artists. The days started off with local or lesser known artists, and continued to grow into the night when headliners such as Drake, The Weeknd, and The Strokes all performed. The nights weren’t the only exciting parts: the Glass Animals, G-Eazy, A$AP Rocky, and Chance the Rapper all put on phenomenal shows during the daytime. Tactics for going to and watching the shows ranged widely. Many people rushed from one show to the other in hopes of seeing as many performances as possible, but they don’t always get the best spots. The amount of people pushing and moving into the crowd to try and get a better spot was unbelievable to me. The other thing people chose to do was miss some performances in hopes of getting better spots at their favorite performers’ stages. Claire Darrow, a junior at Casady commented, “My favorite performance was Walk the Moon because we managed to get a decent spot in the crowd which heightened the whole experience for me. They performed new and old songs, and it was exhilarating to be so close and be around people who liked them just as much as I did.” The performances were indescribable, and for a glimpse into them, go to the ACL website for videos of the performances. The thousands of people watching every show amped up each artist’s excitement, and this led to unbelievable shows.To leave out the food offered when talking about ACL would be a tragedy. The festival offered dozens of the best local food vendors in the area the opportunity to cater the festival. Tiff’s Treats and P. Terry’s Burger Stand stood out to me as having particularly delicious food. Tiff’s Treats provided brownies, cookies, icecream, and an incredible blend of all three in a treat called “Tiff’s Blitz.” Anytime you are in Texas, try and find some time to stop at one of their locations. It’s 100% worth it. P. Terry’s Burger Stand featured the best burger I’ve ever had in my life. I can’t do it justice with words, but they are definitely doing everything right there. Through all of this, ACL achieved great feats with their food and music, and left everyone who went in utter awe of the time they spent at the festival. Looking back and reminiscing on it, all I want to do now is buy my ticket for next year.