UPDATE: The giveaway is now over. We’ll see everyone who got the email on Tuesday. If you did not receive the ticket email, the taping will be livestreamed on ACL’s Youtube channel
Austin City Limits will be taping a performance by Asleep at the Wheel and special guests on Tuesday, Feb. 24th, at 8 pm at ACL Live at The Moody Theater (310 W. 2nd Street, Willie Nelson Blvd). We will be giving away a limited number of space available passes to this taping. Enter your name and email address on the below form by 9 am on Feb. 20th. Winners will be chosen at random and a photo ID will be required to pickup tickets. Winners will be notified by email. Passes are not transferable and cannot be sold. Standing may be required.
No photography, recording or cell phone use in the studio.
Austin City Limits celebrates 40 years on television with a grand finale featuring musical highlights and inductions from the first-ever Austin City Limits Hall of Fame presentation. Hosted by Oscar-winning actor Matthew McConaughey, this never-before-broadcast special showcases outstanding performances and collaborations from the ACL Hall of Fame ceremony held April 26, 2014, including Emmylou Harris, Lyle Lovett, Buddy Guy, Robert Randolph and more. The program also honors the inaugural class of Hall of Fame inductees, featuring legendary music acts Willie Nelson and Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble and a pair of individuals who played an invaluable role in the genesis of the series: show creator Bill Arhos and Texas Longhorns football head coach and ACL supporter Darrell Royal.
For this extraordinary occasion ACL returns to its original Studio 6A, where the series taped its first episode in 1974—featuring Willie Nelson—to honor the artists and individuals who have inspired the iconic television series throughout its four decade run. The intimate performances include inductee Willie Nelson, joined by Lyle Lovett and Emmylou Harris for stunning readings of Nelson-penned classics including “Funny How Time Slips Away”, “Crazy” and “On the Road Again.” Matthew McConaughey inducts his friend and fellow Texan, saying “There would be no Austin City Limits without Willie Nelson.”
photo by Scott Newton
Austin blues-rock giants Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble are honored with a stirring tribute and their signature songs are performed by special guests backed by Double Trouble’s Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon and Reese Wynans. Guitar ace Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Grammy-winning singer Mike Farris perform a scorching rendition of “The House Is Rockin’,” a song Vaughan made iconic. Blues titan and ACL veteran Buddy Guy says, “I wasn’t here when Willie started, but I came soon after,” then demonstrates his incredible guitar prowess with an electrifying take on “Mary Had A Little Lamb.” Steel guitar dynamo Robert Randolph performs a fiery version of “Give Me Back My Wig” joined by Doyle Bramhall II. The special comes to an epic close with an all-star reading of a Lone Star classic as a stellar lineup of guitar slingers blaze through the Stevie Ray Vaughan standard “Texas Flood.”
photo by Scott Newton
Tune in this weekend for this stellar special, and, as always, check your local PBS listings for the broadcast time in your area. Go to the episode page for more info, and don’t forget to click over to our Facebook, Twitter and newsletter pages for more ACL info. Next week: Gary Clark Jr. and Alabama Shakes.
Get your lighters out for one of the most riotous, epic, joyous episodes in the four-decade history of Austin City Limits as the Foo Fighters return for the head-banging blowout of ACL’s milestone anniversary season. In an installment destined to be a future classic, this superstar-caliber performance serves as a colossal closeout to the program’s celebratory Season 40. Dave Grohl & company bring the rock in a non-stop, incredible hour of music that will have viewers on their feet and pledging allegiance to the Foo.
2015 marks the Foo Fighters’ 20th Anniversary, and while the 25-million-record-selling, eleven-time GRAMMY-winning band play sold-out arenas and stadiums across the globe, the modern rock superstars return to ACL’s humble stage on this special occasion. The Foos first appeared during Season 34 in 2008 and recently immortalized Austin and ACL’s executive producer Terry Lickona in an installment of their HBO series Sonic Highways, even recording a song in ACL’s historic, original Studio 6A for the companion audio release.
“Here’s what I think we should do,” says Foo leader Dave Grohl at the outset. “We should play some old songs, we should play some new songs, we should have some guests.” The band stays true to their word, launching into a blistering nine-song attack, performing fan favorites and standout tracks from their acclaimed new release Sonic Highways. The crowd goes wild when Austin guitar great Gary Clark Jr. joins the band for “What Did I Do?/God As My Witness,” the song originally recorded in the Austin episode of the HBO series. Hometown hero and blues guitar legend Jimmie Vaughan joins Clark Jr. and the band onstage for “Tuff Enuff,” the signature song of Vaughan’s Fabulous Thunderbirds, with Grohl on vocals and Vaughan adding his distinctive guitar riffs. The audience is on their feet for the entire hour, pumping their fists in the air and singing along as Foo Fighters make a believer out of everyone, in one of the most entertaining hours of music in ACL history. On the closing anthem “Best of You” Grohl sings, “I’ve got another confession to make/I’m your fool.” So is the Austin audience in a performance that is the ultimate highlight of ACL’s 40th season.
photo by Scott Newton
ACL executive producer Terry Lickona says, “We love us some Foo Fighters!! They are one of the biggest rock bands on the planet right now, and Dave Grohl is a renaissance rock and roll man. He showed us their love on the HBO Sonic Highways series, and this ACL episode is the first major TV showcase for their new music. Ours is a unique relationship, to say the least!”
It might get loud when two of contemporary rock’s best live bands hit the Austin City Limits stage with the return of six-time GRAMMY winners The Black Keys and the debut of rowdy southern rockers J. Roddy Walston & The Business.
“We’re The Black Keys from Akron, Ohio,” says frontman Dan Auerbach, but no introduction is needed. The powerhouse duo of singer/guitarist Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney have spent the better part of a decade building a huge following through relentless touring and word of mouth to become one of music’s biggest live acts, headlining festivals and arenas and earning worldwide acclaim for their irresistible rock and roll. They first appeared on ACL in Season 36 playing one of the last shows in ACL’s original, historic Studio 6A in support of their 2010 breakout album Brothers. The steel-belt rockers return for their second appearance with songs from the triple Grammy-nominated Turn Blue, which debuted at #1 on Billboard‘s album chart, was widely acclaimed as one of 2014’s best records and is a 2015 GRAMMY contender for Best Rock Album. The band reach back to their roots to kick things off in their blistering six-song ACL set, and proceed to tear through soulful tracks from Turn Blue including “Fever,” one of this year’s GRAMMY nominees for both Best Rock Song and Best Rock Performance. With their charged rock and unapologetic guitar riffs, The Black Keys command the ACL stage in a knockout performance.
“I remember seeing The Black Keys for the first time at ACL Fest and wondering, ‘how could just two guys make such great music?’” says ACL executive producer Terry Lickona. “They pour their heart and soul into it, that’s how, and they can excite a crowd more than most bands five times bigger.”
With a scrappy yet sublime sound that honors both their Southern roots and punk spirit, J. Roddy Walston & The Business deliver a must-see ACL debut, performing songs from their acclaimed LP Essential Tremors. The Baltimore-based quartet’s high-intensity five-song set features singer/pianist/guitarist Walston tossing his long mane while headbanging out songs celebrating that great and terrible burden of being human. Their anthems “Heavy Bells”, “Brave Man’s Death” and “Don’t Break the Needle” are some of the sweatiest, ballsiest rock ‘n’ roll ever featured on the ACL stage. It’s all a warm-up, though, for the colossal closer “Used to Did,” on which the band pulls out all the stops for a piano-pounding, guitar-wailing, hair-whipping photo finish.
photo by Scott Newton
“J. Roddy Walston is the perfect warm up for the Keys,” Lickona added. “They are very old-school but also in-the-moment at the same time. Sometimes you just got to let it all hang out!”
Tune in this weekend for this episode, and, as always, check your local PBS listings for the broadcast time in your area. Go to the episode page for more info, and don’t forget to click over to our Facebook, Twitter and newsletter pages for more ACL info. Tune in next week for a brand new episode with the return of Foo Fighters.
Austin City Limits announced the first round of new tapings for the series upcoming Season 41!
Feb. 24 sees the return of Austin City Limits veteran and new Hall of Fame inductee Asleep at the Wheel. The premier Western swing band not only of Texas but of the United States, the Wheel first appeared on the show in Season 1, way back in 1976, and most recently in Season 35 with Willie Nelson. Now leader Ray Benson and company return in support of the upcoming Still the King: Celebrating the Music of Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys, with special guests Amos Lee and The Avett Brothers in tow. We’re happy to welcome Asleep at the Wheel back for its eleventh taping.
On April 1st, we welcome acclaimed country singer Sturgill Simpson to the Austin City Limits stage. The Kentucky native released his first album High Top Mountain in 2013, establishing his philosophical brand of outlaw country. He broke out with his second LP Metamodern Sounds in Country Music, which earned Simpson national press coverage and the Emerging Artist of the Year Award at the 2014 Americana Music Awards & Honors. We’re proud to welcome Simpson for his ACL debut.
photo by Dusdin Condren
April also brings another Austin City Limits debut for the much-lauded rock band The War On Drugs. Following the Philadelphia group’s breakout with 2011’s Slave Ambient and two years of non-stop touring, TWOD – led by singer, songwriter and guitarist Adam Granduciel – reached a new peak with the celebrated Lost in the Dream. Pitchfork calls it a record “loaded with songs whose greatness is revealed slowly, where the simplest, most understated chord change can blow a track wide open and elevate it from simply pretty to absolutely devastating.” We’re thrilled to bring the shimmering indie rock of The War On Drugs to the ACL stage for the first time on April 6th.
Want to be part of our audience? We will post information on how to get free passes about a week before the taping. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter for notice of postings.
New Austin City Limits Hall of Fame inductees Asleep at the Wheel will be joined by guest stars including The Avett Brothers, Amos Lee and others for a special Bob Wills’ tribute on Feb. 24th.
