ACL Fest: 'Turn it up!' Red Hot Chili Peppers close out ACL Fest at Zilker Park
Back to headline Weekend 2, the Red Hot Chili Peppers closed out this year's Austin City Limits Music Festival with a bang of a performance that had a sea of fans stretched across the lawn in front of the American Express stage.
Toward the start of the band’s set, there was a notable hiccup. Fans standing from about the American Express Experience area and back were shouting that they could not hear much of the music and yelled for the sound to be fixed.
“Turn it up, turn it up, turn it up,” the crowd screamed.
After 20 minutes of scattered sound, the volume seemed to be fixed as the Red Hot Chili Peppers continued playing their catalog of hit songs like “Snow (Hey Oh).”
We talked with fans, some who traveled far and wide to see the legendary rock band. Northwest Indiana natives Shane and Crystal Cole flew in to see lead vocalist Anthony Kiedis, bassist Flea, drummer Chad Smith and guitarist John Frusciante perform their greatest hits.
Just minutes before the electrifying quartet made their way to the stage, the Coles said they made the trip to hear "Dani California," "Get on Top," "Suck My Kiss" and the Red Hot Chili Peppers' recent release "Black Summer" in person.
"I'm actually excited about everything," Crystal said as the show started.
Up to an hour before the Red Hot Chili Peppers hit the stage, fans hoisted flags, roared in excitement and squeezed into any area that had a clear view of the concert stage. After finding a comfortable spot toward the front end of the lawn, Brooke Weatherbie was more than prepared for her first live Red Hot Chili Peppers experience.
For Weatherbie, it was a surreal moment. She grew up listening to the “Otherside” rock band, and just moments from seeing the band for the first time, she was getting the same chills she had when she first heard “Californication.”
“Hearing them as a kid and now being 20 and seeing them in person is like really exciting,” Weatherbie said with a large smile.
When fan Alex Vedia first heard the Red Hot Chili Peppers, he was reminded of the grunge era of the 1990s, with a little mix of psychedelic rock.
"I like their groove and style of play," he said.
Those feelings of nostalgia piqued Vedia’s curiosity, so he decided to stop by ACL to see the band perform alongside mega-fan Kelsey Theis, who’s seen the Red Hot Chili Peppers perform more times than she can count.
As Vedia tried to remember the names of his favorite songs, she stepped in to suggest some of the hits they were excited to hear.
As for the moments Theis was looking forward to most, she was hoping to see some high-level improvisation.
“They have some good moments where they just kind of go off script, which is kind of fun,” she said. “They’re an iconic band and they’re very talented. So it’s just fun to watch them in their element, and then their songs are all so good, so whatever they play will be a good time.”
As Theis hoped they would, the Red Hot Chili Peppers broke out into a booming performance that made the band’s headlining set a memorable one, with the strums of Frusciante’s guitar and the onstage acrobatics of Kiedis inciting more roars from the crowd.
Like their Weekend 1 performance, the band ended before their advertised 10 p.m. end time. They stopped about 15 minutes early on Sunday, with ACL Fest's closing night fireworks going off afterward.