It’s been four long years since we last had the opportunity to attend Austin City Limits, but now having returned, it’s solidified as one of our all time favorite events of the year. Through the heat and humidity, Texas’ premier festival continues to diversify its always progressive lineups, serve up the best food imaginable, and beyond. Please read on for our in-depth review of the event below.

Three days of seeing your favorite bands on Planet Earth might be just the most exhilarating thing a human can experience. Now having had the chance to attend the festival as media and witness it through a different lens, it’s outrageous the amount of wheels in motion that have to happen in order for this to all go down. Though we just attended the second weekend, here’s a shout out the production team, construction workers, and more that put it all together.

We’ll certainly be putting together additional in-depth articles that highlight our favorite acts, but for starters, each day was an intense journey through classic artists that spanned genres, decades, and styles. Friday itself was incredible in the sense that we got to see Wet Leg, Genesis Owusu, L’Imperatrice, Phoenix, Billy Strings, and P!nk…and that’s just one day. Cycling between the Honda, T-Mobile, American Express, and Barton Springs stages was actually quite easy given the amount of people who attended. That’s a major accomplishment that we noticed was that even late into the night, it never really felt overpacked or oversold, fairly easy to navigate from stage to stage in order to split time with your favorite acts or hunker down to grab that perfect spot.

Now while the music was of course the obvious highlight, ACL Festival is so much more than just music. We experienced a wide variety of different foods and drinks that we just wouldn’t be able to get at home in Los Angeles. Our highlights on that front were easily a dish of Korean BBQ Kimchi Fries that were simply mind blowing, especially at only $11. The beer selection in the Barton Springs Beer Hall were also overwhelming, to the point where you could basically come back and try something new each time, all the while hydrating in that rough Texas heat.

As we move forward into 2023 and look forward to another jaw dropping lineup, one that’s definitely going to be tough to top, there truly aren’t many things that we’d change going forward. Getting in and out of the festival through the free shuttle was seamless and painless. Even staying outside the city was relatively easy while renting a car. For now though, we’ll be counting the days until the big lineup drop comes. Keep an eye on our future articles surrounding individual shows we saw.

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ACL Weekend 2: The Perfect Event for Music Lovers