ACL Festival (n.) - a really, really big 3-day music festival that happens every year in Austin. Over a hundred bands show up to play. And the number of people who show up to see said bands is probably immeasurable. Seriously, this place was people-tastic. So I took myself out there to see a trio of awesome: Gnarls Barkley, Thievery Corporation, and John Mayer. I was wayyyy in the back of the crowd for Gnarls, but they definitely rocked the house and Cee-Lo was one energetic mofo. Then I made it up to the front row for Thievery, which was a bit.. interesting. I was in the middle of a huge weed haze, thanks to the fact that everyone else who was there to see Thievery was a massive stoner. The actual group is only two DJ's but the live band has about 6 more people in addition, not counting the 7 or so vocalists who came on stage to perform different songs. It was the vocalists who probably surprised me more than anyone else. I'm not sure if all those people were the actual ones who recorded the original tracks - except the three Rastafarians, those guys were definitely the real deal.A while later came John Mayer, who just released his new album a few days before. He's got practically a whole new lineup in his band, including some really experienced old guys on the keys and backup guitar. JM's gone blues in his new stuff, which made for a really odd combination of that and his old poppy acoustic songs during the show. I still don't quite know what to make of the show; it just didn't have a coherent whole to it. I do know that the man's got talent and he's an even better guitarist than he was when I saw him as a freshman. I also know that it is, in fact, possible to walk home from Zilker Park all the way to West Campus.