Early reactions....

I love it!
I hate it!
It is awesome!
It sucks.
Too many old people bands!
Too many teenie-bopper bands!


there you go, now you don't have to read the eight million comments in the thread below.

and if you live under a rock, the line up is here.

9 hours or so...

until the line up is released.

its been fun this year.

cheers.

Blonde Redhead

A couple of readers in Austin emailed me this morning to let me know that it was announced last night, after their show at Stubbs was canceled due to weather, that Blonde Redhead said they will be back in Austin to play ACL Fest.

Crossword Answers and thoughts

Okay, so the 15 bands revealed in the crossword were as follows:
White Stripes
Bjork
Peter, Bjorn and John
Joss Stone
Rodrigo Y Gabriela
Decemberists
Rose Hill Drive
Andrew Bird
Augustana
Robert Earl Keen
Beau Soleil
Gotan Project
Indigo Girls
Heartless Bastards
Andy Palacio

This is good news, as all of them were on "the list" posted down below.
Does that mean the list is 100% accurate? Probably not, but it does add to it's validity.

The Crossword Puzzle is up...

looks like they put it up early...

our hounds are on it now...

i'll list confirmations as we figure them out

crossword puzzle?

Just got this from a source, but have heard nothing about it. Keep your eyes open and let me know if you see it:

"Lineup comes out 12:01 am on Thursday May 10th. Also look in the
Statesman and or Chronicle this Thursday for a special crossword we're
doing where 15 of the bands will be leaked on there. That should be fun
for you to play."

update

Been emailing back and forth with another source lately. Pretty interesting email this morning, with a good amount of info, if it is true...
The first part of the email is dealing with an argument on the acl fest BBS about Attal actually booking the show by himself or not, but it leads into the meat of what I wante to post about today, so I left it in.

Someone challenged that Charles Attal is NOT doing all the booking personally- This is false. I called Mrs. Amy Corbin, VP at Charles Attal Presents (the "Attal Booking" division) just a while ago, and she was once again willing to pump out some info and tid bits on the fest- But first to the info. on Charles...

Contrary to popular belief, Attal actually has done all the booking this year, for both Lolla and for ACL. Most all of the acts are signed well in advance of the lineup release, insuring no foul- ups. Because of last years leak, Attal decided that not only would he do all the booking inside his own company, but the top 40% of the acts that he pursued he did so personally, and he has been keeping the finalized list incredibly secret. As of now, the only people who have seen the signed artists are the executives at C3, three pay scales down from the top(from President to Marketing VP), as well as the President of CSE, and Marketing managers that are in charge of ACL Fest productions.

So to say that Charles doesn't do all the booking personally is false, he does. Amy informed me that there is a cut off deadline of May 2nd at 5:00 P.M., and at that time there will be an executive meeting at C3 to inform the hierarchy of the finalized list, and call all of the record labels, band managers and reps. as well as bands to inform them of when the final list will be announced. Artists who were signed with "time constraints" will be told what day they will be playing, but not the time because the scheduling process has not yet begun.

Lastly, the finalized list will be formally constructed on May 6th or 7th, depending on Attals traveling constraints, and will be handed over to CSE on appox. May 8th, when the "Marketing Managers" will then take the list to their people, who will plug the names into the web site design as well as other medias.

THATS THE SCOOP! Amy told me that CSE will run a live 2 minute test of the lineup page with this years list on May 9th during the afternoon, just to confirm that the design works correctly- So you may want to have all the blood sucking ACL fans click onto the official page a million times that day, it may actually work!

The only other bit of info. I got out of Amy was that ACL is already being heralded as the "best festival of 2007" by many in the "biz" who know Charles personally and have been clued into the bands that are playing. My advice is this- One, get ready for a big surprise, something that nobody could have ever guessed, and two: Don't believe ANY lists- they are all fake.

Heres my last comment- I emailed the fake list (both the one from ACLFAN and the one you put up on your site, I didn't know if they were any different), and Amy went through and highlighted all the bands that would be playing- This is the quote she gave me on the phone, verbatim, "Well, I have 69 bands here! I am probably forgetting some, but for the most part the core of this list is correct....I mean, there is no Stevie Wonder, there is no Bob Dylan, there is no Neil Young, but all in all, this is a pretty good guess!"

I find this to be pretty interesting.
if you take that long list, take out Dylan, Young and Wonder and then just list 69 acts in reverse order of what you look forward to, I bet you still come up with a great list.
Also, with that update, we find out we are only a week or so away from the line up coming out.
The bump in the date leads me to believe that either A)we might be on to something as far as the line up goes, and CAP/CSE wants to get the line up out before it really breaks out or B)this was the plan all along.

Again, until we see the list from Attal (or get some confirms from band's pages) we will look at this as rumor.

Small Update on "The List"

Again, I STRESS, most of that list is unconfirmed.
All we have actual confirmation on is in the list on the left.

That being said, I talked to our leaker again and he said that the poster he was was a mock up how how the end result would look, that a lot of the artists were on CAP's wishlist and still under negotiation, but he said its still pretty accurate.

Vedder and the Killers were in parenthesis on the poster he saw, just as filler for other headliners names down the road, so they do not seem likely at all.

I think it is interesting that they would have those 2 in parenthesis, as space filler while waiting to confirm other acts, but not some of the other big names.

Anyway, still no confirmation that it is real, but we are working on it.

promise.

kisses-
j

RUMOR: Grain of Salt....

I know, the name of the site is news AND rumors, but I usually try to shy away from the rumor stuff all together. Too much BS to weed through most of the time and really not worth the headache.

But as much of you have noticed, an anonymous poster in the comments below posted what (s)he claims is a list pulled straight from the poster for the festival and frankly, its too good to not discuss.

Ive emailed back and forth with said person, and (s)he is by far the most believable line up leaker I have come across so far.

That being said, until these names can be confirmed, we should consider this list to just be rumor.

so here you go:

Interpol
the Arcade Fire
the Decemberists
Kings of Leon
Ben Kweller
the New Pornographers
the Black Keys
Sparklehorse
Andrew Bird
Kaiser Chiefs
Damien Rice
Explosions in the Sky
the White Stripes
Wilco
Gov't Mule
Spoon
the Black Angels
My Morning Jacket
Modest Mouse
the Roots
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
the Hold Steady
Yo La Tengo
the Polyphonic Spree
Asleep at The Wheel
Peter Yorn
Joss Stone
Robert Earl Keen
Joseph Arthur
Peter, Bjorn, and John
LCD Soundsystem
Heartless Bastards
Crowded House
Queens of The Stone Age
The Killers
GOTAN Project
The Good, the Bad & The Queen
Bjork
T Bone Burnett
The Might Clouds of Joy
James Hunter
Amos Lee
The Dynamites
Big Sam's Funky Nation
Andy Palacio
Del McCoury Band
Kevin McKinney
Fionn Regan
John Ralston
Will Hoge
Amy Whinehouse
Augustana
Raul Malo
The National
Broken West
Bela Fleck & The Flecktones
Stephen Marley
Steve Earle
Blue October
Zap Mama
Indigo Girls
Cross Canadian Ragweed
Paolo Nutini
Zap Mama
Kelly Willis
Butch Walker
Beau Soliel
Devotchka
Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings
Back Dr. Slam
Yusuf Islam
Bob Dylan
The Little Ones
Sound Team
Ryan Shaw
STS9
Of Montreal
Ian Ball
Lucinda Williams
Lily Allen
Rodrigo Y Gabriela
Rosehill Drive
Artic Monkeys
Bloc Party
Ghostland Observatory
Reverend Horton Heat
Regina Spektor
JJ Grey & Mofro
Eli Young Band
Ziggy Marley
Jon Dee Graham
Eddie Vedder
Stevie Wonder
Neil Young

Corcoran with another specualtion

Over at the Statesmen blog, Michael Corcoran has another speculation on who the headliners will be.
While I, personally, support his choices, Corcoran really seems to have nothing to base his speculation on.

Here is the meat:

Since most of the people going to ACL buy their tickets before a single act is named, there’s always a frenzy to find out asap who you just spent $120- $145 to see. But with this clarification about Attal’s adjective, it’s time to rule out U2, the Who, Pink Floyd and a Rolling Stones return to Zilker and start thinking more in terms of Bjork, White Stripes and Bob Dylan.

Andrew Bird on La Blogothèque

Since news is crawling, I figured I would link to this.

And I suppose it is ACL Fest relevant, since Andrew Bird is playing this year.

Anyway, you may have seen the La Blogothèque episode with Arcade Fire playing in an elevator, but I think this one is even better.

Enjoy:


#45.2 - Andrew Bird - Spare-Oh
Uploaded by lablogotheque

Radiohead Out

From Austin360:

Austin City Limits promoter Charles Attal confirmed Monday that Radiohead will not be part of this year's ACL Fest in September.

"We couldn’t make the scheduling work" Attal said. Neither Pollstar nor the band's website has any tour dates for the band.

$120 tickets sold out

From the site:

The limited-quantity Earlybird price sold out in record time. Don't fret though tickets are still available at the Regular rate of $145. No service charges. No surprises. No lie.

Problems with ticket ordering

One of our faithful posted in the comments of our last post that there is a problem with ordering directly from the email.
Apparently if you follow the link through the email it only offers $145 tickets right now, but $120 tickets are still an option if you follow the link from the ACL Fest website.

So just save yourself a headache and go through the site.

Tickets on Sale Now

$120, no service charges, for first tier and $145, no service charges, after that.

People are already complaining about the price, but 120 flat is only 17 bucks higher than the first tier last year (90+13). Add that to the fact that it cost 10 bucks shipping for the tickets last year (you have the option to print them for free this year) and we are down to a $7 difference.

Also, you have the option for VIP again this year, here is the info on those from the website:

Friends of the Festival Packages

Want to put a little creature comforts in your Festival experience? Be a VIP and enjoy ACL in style and ease with special amenities in the VIP Grove. The package is full of the comfort and refreshments you deserve.

WHAT YOU GET:

VIP Passes (serves as three-day tickets)
VIP Grove access, which includes:

• Food servings daily
• Guest chef tastings
• Beer, wine, and specialty drinks
• ACL mini spa and misting system
• Special daily snacks
• Shade and seating in the VIP Grove (no stage seating/viewing)
• Water
• Air conditioned restrooms
• VIP parking pass (with package of four only)
• Two commemorative t-shirts

PACKAGE PRICE:
Four for $3,400
Two for $1,700

OTHER DETAILS:

• No stage access with the package.
• No refunds or exchanges.
• No variations on the package or price.
• Unfortunately, we are unable to upgrade general admission tickets purchased through Front Gate Tickets to VIP Packages.

No Service Charges...

From Austin360.com:

Austin-based C3 Presents has announced that it will no longer tack on service charges to ticket prices at the three major festivals it produces, including the Austin City Limits Music Festival Sept. 14- 16 in Zilker Park. "There is an expense to ticketing, but that will be figured into the ticket price," said C3’s Charlie Walker. "But now there will be no surprises. If a show is advertised at $100, that’s what it will cost, not $114 after service charges."

Walker said fans have long complained about hidden charges, which inspired the "no service charge" change, which will first go into effect at Lollapalooza Aug. 3-5 at Chicago's Grant Park. Other promoters have suspended service and handling charges on occasional events, but Walker says he thinks this is the first time it’s become policy for festival promoters. The Lollapalooza lineup, announced Thursday, is headlined by Pearl Jam, Ben Harper, the Stooges, Muse, Modest Mouse and Daft Punk. Tickets are $195 for a three-day package.

The ACL Fest ticket price will be announced next week.

Austin360 stuff

Looks like Austin360.com has decided to get on the ball with ACL Fest info a bit earlier this year. I wonder what spurred them to do that?

Anyway, along with an 'All you need to know' section, they have a few notes on who will/won't be playing:

The lineup for the sixth annual Austin City Limits Music Festival, to be held Sept. 14- 16 at Zilker Park, is at least a month away from its official unveiling, so the rumors have been flying furiously. The Police and Pearl Jam are two names being thrown around, along with last year’s wish listers: Radiohead and Red Hot Chili Peppers. And it sure looks like the reunited Smashing Pumpkins (Billy Corgan’s back together again), who are playing every festival that doesn’t include a livestock contest, are headed here in September.

But the Police are definitely not playing ACL. They’ve got dates in Amsterdam during ACL. And fest booker Charles Attal told me that Pearl Jam is not on the bill. Asked about the Pumpkins and the Chili Peppers, Attal Blackberried back that the headliners are even bigger.

Who could he be referring to? Radiohead, for starters. The British band hasn’t announced a U.S. tour yet, but this could be the year. Also, Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan seem about ripe for their ACL Fest debut. I’m going to guess that the White Stripes and Foo Fighters- two acts looking to tour heavily this summer and fall - will be among the biggies coming to Austin.

Not really much more than speculation there, but probably worth keeping an eye on.

Andrew Bird

According to the tour page at the Fat Possum site, Andrew Bird is playing ACL Fest on the 15th.

Link

Info on cheap presale tickets

Im sure, if you read this site, you got the email from the ACL folks yesterday.
The 3000 presale tickets ($50 this year) are going to be sold in a different manner this year.
Here are the details (from the sign up page here):

First, see some changes we are making:

• No service fees:
  There are no additional service fees or shipping charges. The price you see is the price you pay. No service charges or surprises will be added to the published ticket price. This simplifies the experience for everyone and doesn't surprise you at the cash register.
• How we select winners:
  This is a random drawing for eligibility. When you sign up below, your name is in the drawing for a total of 3,000 tickets.
• Why we aren't doing it like last year:
  The "first-come-first-serve" method breaks. So, we will randomly select subscribers and allow about 1,500 lucky folks to buy 2 tickets. This way it depends on your desire to play, and it is a pure game of chance. You won't be at the mercy of web servers, slow email, saboteurs, or gremlins. It's more fair.

Entrants will be chosen randomly to have the opportunity to buy these extra special three-day passes.
Once signed up, entrants will receive an email next Tuesday, April 10. This email will give you the opportunity to click and see if you won the chance to buy the $50 Tickets.
Watch your email closely! When you receive this message, click through quickly.
If you are a lucky eligible buyer, you will be instructed on how to purchase tickets, but you MUST complete your transaction quickly. There will be a finite period of time to make your purchase.
There is a limit of 2 tickets per person/credit card/address.
If you are currently a subscriber, you must still submit your entry.
If you are not already a subscriber, submitting this info will make you one.
You have until April 9 at 12 noon to sign-up in order to be eligible.
If your karma wasn't fully charged and you didn't get a chance to buy a souvenir ticket, wait 'til April 17. That's when tickets go on sale. We'll let you know by email and text.

Good Luck!

If you remember last year's fiasco, you will probably be pleased with how they are doing it this year. Though Im sure there will still be some haters when it comes to this method as well.

Kings of Leon

According to their interview here, Kings of Leon will be returning to ACL Fest this year.

A couple of confirmations...

According to his website, Robert Earl Keen is playing on the 14th.

Christina Bell also has the 14th confirmed on her MySpace page.

Wilco and Bloc Party?

Word is, if you hop over to the archive pages of kexp.org and listen to the March 14th broadcast, around the 6pm(cst) mark you can hear one of the producers of the ACL TV show comment on the fact that both Wilco and Bloc Party are scheduled to tape appearances for the next season of the show. This could mean they are both going to play the fest this year, as most of the tapings are done around the festival.

The producer is also said to mention the Arcade Fire as on his hopeful list.

On the wiki rumors

A lot of people keep emailing me about the "Rumored Acts" on the wikipedia page.
Im sure that list plays out more like a wish list for people then actual rumors. Remember, last year the wiki page included Pearl Jam, Smashing Pumpkins, Outkast and a ton of others that didn't end up playing the fest.

Not much...

Besides the MySpace confirmations of The Rev. Horton Heat, Asleep at the Wheel and Blue Mother Tupelo, there isn't much to report.
Im going to start digging more starting today, and remember to send anything you find over to me at aclfestnews at gmail dot com.
As soon as more starts being confirmed, I will start a list on the left (like last year).

Cheers.

2007 Dates

Just a reminder. the dates for the 2007 festival are September 14-16.

Getting started

Okay, last year's blog was started the first week of March.
I figured I would go ahead and start one for this year a little early.