little ynna: austin city limits 2014 weekend 2

This weekend we went to Austin for the 2nd weekend of the Austin City Limits Music Festival. We went with our friends Mike and Cheryl and had a fantastic time and saw so many great acts.

This picture was taken right after we saw Sam Smith on Day 1. We got into Austin right at the beginning of set on Friday night. It felt like there were 100,000 people at Zilker Park, no exaggeration. Compared to Coachella, my only other music festival, ACL felt ENORMOUS. Day 1 was the sweatiest day but we saw: Sam Smith, Childish Gambino, Belle & Sebastian and Outkast.

We got pretty good seats for Belle & Sebastian^^

Outkast was a blast!

On Saturday morning it rained and stopped right when we wanted to go back to the park. This made for cool temperatures and lots of mud. I was kind of in shock that I was a little bit chilly on Saturday compared to Friday's sweat fest. On Saturday we saw: Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue, Zoe, Iggy Azalea, The Avett Brothers, Broken Bells, Skrillex and Eminem.

Iggy Azalea was one of my favorite shows of the weekend. I have an Iggy running playlist and I've always liked her songs, but after seeing her perform, despite being super far and super crowded, I have the biggest crush on her. She's beautiful, so sassy, sexy and can spit. Dem. Beats. A guy puked in front of me at her show and if I weren't wearing sandals, I would have stepped in it to get a little closer. At the end of the weekend, I rated all the shows we had seen by whether or not I would pay to see them if they came to Dallas. I would 100% pay to see Iggy again.

We got great spots for Broken Bells. This was one of the coolest shows of the weekend because James Mercer and Danger Mouse are incredible musicians. Also, this show was visually amazing. At the end there were giant bouncy balls in the crowd.

On Sunday we walked around the University of Texas campus and had the best donuts in the world at Gourdough's, pictured above and below. If you are ever in Austin, make the stop to this food truck because it's insane.

Another really great part about ACL were the food stands. All the stands were local restaurants that took the best things from their menu and sold them. It was a great variety of delicious foods and I had everything from gyros to brisket nachos. Also, ACL is super tech savvy and when you activated your wristband, you could attached a credit card to it and pay with your wristband. Maybe that's not a new thing, but I was very impressed with this system.

On Sunday we saw Cults, Jenny Lewis, Lorde and Calvin Harris. Preston also saw Zedd, but I was too deep into the crowd for Lorde to join him.

Cults were great and Madeline Follin is adorable^^

Probably my favorite show because we were front row was Jenny Lewis. I love Voyager and listened to a lot of Rilo Kiley in middle school, so it was an absolute dream to see her so close. Jenny is wildly talented and I wanted to hang out with her afterwards. She had a beautiful voice and such a great stage presence, I was stoked to be in the front row.

I would probably not pay more than $30 to see Jenny Lewis if she came to Dallas only because I couldn't have asked for a better show in Austin. She makes my all-time girl crush list forever.

I'll be honest, I was most excited to see Lorde and she probably would have been my favorite show if 1) I had been closer to the stage and 2) she would have sung more. I was surrounded by giants at the beginning of Lorde and had to weave my way in, but by the end I had a pretty good spot for a headliner. So I still have a lot of respect for her, but my biggest complaint after her show was the fact that I felt like didn't sing as much as she could have. She would do the thing where she had the audience sing or she would just thrash around and let her backup singers do the work. I think she has great stage presence, but I paid the big bucks and squeezed my way through a crowd to her Lorde sing, not the weekend 2 crowd or her backup singers.

Overall, I thought she was great and I had a good time. She was worth it to me and I think I would still pay to see her in Dallas.

We ended the night with a Calvin Harris dance party and drove back to Dallas. ACL was a great time and if you're ever in Austin when it's going on, go!