For its 15th anniversary edition, the annual Austin City Limits Music Festival pulled out all the stops with its three-day, two-weekend lineup. The double-dose bill, which kicked off this weekend (Sept 30–Oct 2), featured standout performances from internationally acclaimed acts like Radiohead, Kendrick Lamar, LCD Soundsystem, Mumford & Sons and HAIM, plus a slew of industry mainstays, indie darlings and local up-and-comers. Nearly all of those were scheduled masterfully, with Friday focused on rock (Foals, Band of Horses, M83, Radiohead), Saturday on hip-hop (DJ Mustard, LL Cool J feat. DJ Z-Trip, Schoolboy Q, Kendrick) and Sunday primarily on country / roots rock (Kacey Musgraves, Margo Price, Chris Stapleton, Nathaniel Rateliff, St Paul and the Broken Bones, Mumford).
The stellar roster screamed world-class, yet the festival likewise cemented itself as one of the top international multi-day music gatherings by revamping its image: a more open layout—which saw the elimination of the central Austin Ventures stage, doing away with sound bleed and opening up thoroughfares and green spaces—featured multiple clusters of colorful flags emulating the iconic Glastonbury emblems, as if to say, “Our fest will feel like home to any veteran of the scene.” The fest gods seemed to agree, gracing the sprawling grassy grounds of Barton Springs-adjacent Zilker Park with nearly perfect weather all weekend: temperatures never breached mid-’80s, and it was actually kinda cold (!) at night—prime weather for some unforgettable grooves.
Check out our top five performances of Weekend One:
1. Kendrick Lamar
Since Kendrick Lamar’s last appearance at ACL Fest three years ago, he’s released two albums—2015’s To Pimp a Butterfly and this year’s compilation untitled unmastered.—and cemented himself not only as a prominent voice in the Black Lives Matter movement (see “Alright,” which provided a literally explosive start to his Saturday set’s encore with its pyro-drenched production) but also, on a larger scale, as an artist uniting several generations of ardent hip-hop fans. His return Saturday night to headline the massive Samsung main stage was nothing short of a cross-conceptual coup: key cuts like “THat Part” (led by guest Schoolboy Q), “Swimming Pools (Drank)” and “A.D.H.D.” maintained party flow, while rapid-fire, slam-poetry–inspired songs like “For Sale? (Interlude)” and “For Free? (Interlude)” left fans with some food for thought to chew on for days to come.
2. Radiohead
For the bulk of Radiohead’s Friday-night headlining set, their first ever appearance at ACL Fest, frontman Thom Yorke appeared energetic and jovial, even throwing in an a cappella snippet of the Smith’s “How Soon is Now?”—“I go about things the wrong way / I am human and I need to be loved / just like everybody else does”—as an intro to “2+2=5.” Who knows if that was meant to be read any deeper than a fun, random riff, but in any case, love for the now-classic rock band—30 years in the game, ya’ll—abounded as they killed it on myriad career highlights, including “The National Anthem,” “Idioteque,” “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” and “Karma Police.” Epic light show, epic jams (Jonny Greenwood’s solo on “Paranoid Android” will always induce chills)—can’t wait to see what specialties they pull out for Weekend 2.
3. Cage the Elephant
Here’s a rock band that’s come a long way since forming a decade ago. Back in the early days, the Kentucky-bred outfit would rile up crowds of a few hundred with early, career-launching hits like “In One Ear,” “Ain’t No Rest For the Wicked” and “Back Against the Wall,” much of their kinetic stage presence stemming from brothers Matt (singer) and Brad (guitarist) Shultz’s wild antics. With new Dan Auerbach-produced album Tell Me I’m Pretty, their sound has smoothed out and matured immensely, but the fun-loving insanity of their live show has only increased. On Saturday, during a rainbow-shrouded sunset, the band commanded a throng of tens-of-thousands, with the Shultz brothers continually launching themselves into the crowd, singing and playing in fans faces. At this point, their old radio hits are well on the way to becoming classic rock gems not likely to be forgotten, and the way they’re conducting their maelstrom live shows, the memory of those won’t soon fade either.
4. Julien Baker
For just one small gal, all alone on stage with an electric guitar, Julien Baker sure can pack a punch. The thrust of the 21-year-old Memphis singer-songwriter’s presence Friday on the tiny BMI stage didn’t emanate so much from the volume of her music—songs from solo debut Sprained Ankle are soothingly soft and slow—but from the weight of her lyrics, some of the most stirring poetry, dark yet inspiring, ever set to music. During this set, she had the unfortunate luck of playing directly across from South African rave-rap trio Die Antwoord on the massive Honda main stage. Her quieter moments were often marred by their booming bass, and she often appeared on the verge of tears. Yet, given the solemn context of her music, that visible emotion only added to the music’s artistic weight, and when she projected climactic lines on “Rejoice” and “Vessels” to the point of drowning out her raucous opponents across the field, the sentimental wave washing over the audience was unmistakably triumphant.
5. St. Paul and the Broken Bones
There was plenty of roots-rock revival going around at ACL Fest this year, especially on Sunday with big-name, main-stage acts like Nathanial Rateliff & the Night Sweats and Mumford & Sons. But Birmingham, Alabama’s St. Paul and the Broken Bones stood out unmatched as the group serving up the most soul. Frontman Paul Janeway was oozing it. An impassioned preacher of a man (literally wearing a religious robe until he threw it off at the end of stripped-down opening gospel anthem “Crumbling Light Posts, Pt.”), he fell to the ground, clutching his mic like it might save his life as he wolf-howled the repeating lyrics “It’s all she left me with!,” inducing widespread cheers as the boisterous brass section brought the song home. The church of Saint Paul: not to be missed at ACL Fest Weekend Two—or at any fest, for that matter.
—Photographs by David Brendan Hall