It was 2011, near the end of a long drought and shortly after the Lost Pines Fire in Bastrop destroyed my favorite forest.

Fun Fun Fun Fest had just moved to Auditorium Shores in Austin and the lineup looked pretty good. My concert buddy and I turned up with a list of bands we wanted to see.

I was still excited about Occupy Wall Street around that time, even though the movement seemed to be fading. I didn’t participate beyond checking out the “Occupation” at Austin City Hall, but still I wondered, was this about to be “the revolution”?

So we show up at the festival and everyone is wearing bandanas over their faces like a bunch of insurgents. I was like, oh shit. OWS is getting its second wind. Maybe I underestimated them.

Just then a gust of wind caught me in the face and I got a mouthful of dirt. Summer had killed all the grass along Auditorium Shores. Every time the wind blew it was like getting sandblasted in the face.

The dust was so bad my friend’s allergies flared up and he had to bail partway through.

I saw some good shows despite the dust. I was impressed with how far Budos Band had come since I saw them the first time. Love that Ethiopian world funk. Saw Grimes before she dated Elon.

Not bad. Witch house, I guess you’d call it. Public Enemy put on a hell of a show. I waited for them to mention OWS, but they never did. Kool Keith cracked me up. For some reason I got more out of the rappers.

I still kinda wish I’d gone to the Danzig show. My buddy got to see Glenn Danzig throw his jealous fit because Slayer had a bigger stage, the one where he drove off and left his band. That would’ve been entertaining.

No complaints. Instead I saw Public Enemy who were as badass as I hoped they would be. I wondered if they might mention OWS, but it seemed like a pretty white movement… They didn’t mention it.

I kept waiting for a sign that police truncheons and infighting hadn’t killed OWS yet.

Eventually I figured Henry Rollins was a radical guy as well as a great storyteller. If he didn’t bring up OWS, then that was it. No revolution. At least not yet…