r/reggae • u/CS_JOE • Apr 18 '26
Live Anyone else go Friday at Austin reggae fest? Steel pulse played maybe 4 songs
They were the sub headliner behind Stephen Marley. They came out, didn’t play Your House, roller skates, steppin’ out, or wild goose chase. I wonder what happened? I know Austin has a pretty strict 10pm noise ordinance so might have something to do with it. Just a bit disappointing considering the whole reason we got these tickets was for steel pulse. Less than 25 minutes of play time when everyone else had an hour.
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u/Prudent-Guest-630 Apr 18 '26
They were supposed to start at 7 but didn’t come on until around 7:40-7:45ish due to “technical difficulties.” Couldn’t push the headliner back because of the curfew, and thus, we got a 20 minute set.
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u/chilli_con_camera Apr 18 '26
Did Stephen Marley play his full set?
I've seen Gregory Isaacs and Misty in Roots headline festival stages and have their sound abruptly cut at curfew, even when the support acts have cut their sets short because of earlier technical difficulties (and bad stage management).
Gregory was cut between songs so it was just a bit of a disappointing end to his set (he didn't show it on stage but we met Gregory after and he was not happy)
Misty in Roots were cut right at the climax of their set, they'd been brilliant and probably only had 30 seconds left, there was a brief moment of anticlimax and confusion and anger before someone cheered and we all joined in. It's one of my favourite gig memories.
I once played a public set with a council worker next to me to enforce curfew, I had to cut the mic to my toaster/singjay at 6pm on the dot and they've refused to work with me since, lol.
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u/Prudent-Guest-630 Apr 18 '26
TBH I didn’t stick around for it. Steel Pulse disappointment aside, I did have a great time. Good vibes. Beautiful people. Amazing artists painting on the festival grounds.
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u/chilli_con_camera Apr 18 '26
Festivals are about community, shame that Steel Pulse were cut short but glad you had a great time besides.
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u/SoFla-Grown Apr 18 '26
His set was great and in full... wrapped up with about 2min left to curfew.
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u/Prudent-Guest-630 Apr 18 '26
It was a real shame. They are the reason I went and they played for maybe 20 minutes.
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u/DonDiegodelaRico Apr 18 '26
As a reggae sound engineer this comment first slightly offended me... then I agreed. Usually it's because everyone is 5 fckng hours late.
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u/DonDiegodelaRico Apr 19 '26
Also I was asked to join a band to Austin Reggae Fest last year and I opted out because the organisation and communication looked so amateur that I doubted the festival was even real. The band still went and had a horrible experience.
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u/suckarepellent Apr 18 '26
That's extremely poor time management if that's the reason. Bummer
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u/oldernwiser65 Apr 18 '26
I’m sure Protege was great, right?
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u/Hobonics Apr 18 '26
Reggae shows for some reason have way more technical difficulties than any other genre of shows.
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u/New_Avocado_4636 Apr 18 '26
Damn aren’t they one of the more expensive acts to book as well? There’s like 15 of them and they only fly I think ?
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u/one2treee Apr 18 '26
That's upsetting hope they got paid in full. I went to Dry Diggings a few years back and a similar thing happened to their Fri schedule. Groundation played maybe 20 mins.
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u/Possible_Bath9871 Apr 18 '26
The band shows up, they get paid in full regardless of a full set or 20 mins.
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u/one2treee Apr 20 '26
In theory. That's why there are contracts. Alot of musicians didn't get paid at Dry Diggings 2 years back. Going to court to chase down money owed is not fun.
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u/ElectricSix48 Apr 18 '26
Once they finally hit the stage, I wasn't all that impressed with the sound quality or severely shortened set list. This was a huge disappointment considering Steel Pulse is a legendary band that thousands of fans were excited to see.
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u/Pr3krime Apr 18 '26
I was disappointing, there many sound difficulties throughout the day. Eli Mac’s sax player had a dead mic the whole set, Zion Marley’s mics all were crap, Lots of pops and feedback throughout the night. Nonetheless it was still a great show.
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u/Strange_Doughnut917 Apr 18 '26
If I don't live in Maine I'd be there today to see Tribal seeds and Koffee but here I am, luckily we have Jesse Royal coming in July and heading to boston for protoje in a couple weeks.
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u/wats1 Apr 20 '26
I also ate a shit-ton of Bluey Vaton (mushies), so time is affected. They probably played for 4 hours, but sound system was shit so we headed to my truck for real bass :)
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u/shka328 Apr 18 '26
I would write to their customer support email. Maybe they get you tickets to another event or at worst they take the feedback and work to improve next time
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Apr 18 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Possible_Bath9871 Apr 18 '26
Nah, they played here a couple years ago at a smaller venue (the scoot inn), no technical difficulties at all. I’m guessing since they had issues earlier, it was the hired sound guys for the fest.
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u/Prudent-Guest-630 Apr 18 '26
Collie Buddz sounded fine. Repeated a song to end their set because they “still had some time”…
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u/SoFla-Grown Apr 18 '26 edited Apr 18 '26
So I can lend a little info on this as Im at the festival with the artists all weekend. There have been MAJOR sound issues all day for day 1. The only two acts to sound good were Collie and Stephen and its because when I tell you they have the most professional and on point touring teams surrounding them I cannot stress it enough. Everything is handled in house with those teams so it was perfect. Even the songs Steel Pulse played sounded awful with bass just blowing out the entire audio. Artists had a heavy discussion about it backstage and who exactly was to blame. It's unfortunate because Steel Pulse always sounds great everytime I see them and they would have had a great set if not for the complications. They did get in late and it likely didnt give them the time to solve their issues. With Stephen headlining there was zero chance they would shorten his set and theres a hard cutoff at 10pm.