Mumford & Sons bring Noah Kahan, 2 local bands and lasers to third ACL Fest headlining set

Don’t call it a comeback — they’ve been here for years.

“It’s a simple rule of thumb guys. If Mumford is active they’re probably headlining this fest,” a Reddit post observed five months ago as the Austin City Limits Music Festival lineup was revealed.

I’ve come to terms with this universal truth, reviewing the divisive banjo rockers favorably twice at this publication, in 2016 and 2019, and similarly enjoying the three-peat Sunday night at ACL. (Oh, and Marcus Mumford performed ACL ‘22 solo too.)

“We’re Mumford & Sons and we can’t help ourselves, we keep on coming back,” Mumford told the crowd at the American Express Stage early on Sunday, just before “Little Lion Man,” a song that you have to think is disproportionately more well-known by osmosis around the greater Austin area relative to the rest of the U.S.

Pre-show, the Austin High School marching band warmed up Zilker from the AmEx stage. These trombone shorties performed a hip-hop hit and the symbolism was obvious: For Mumford, ACL is homecoming.

The crowd was exuberant enough to leave its feet during the big songs, make no mistake. And there were some new moves. Mumford, a 36-year-old Aquarius, sang “Lover Of the Light” while playing drums. There were noisy electric guitars. Electronic keyboard flourishes. Lasers. A great brass trio there to puncture the heartfelt parts with some sweet whole notes. Guest stars.

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Mumford himself still strolls into the crowd to sing with fans. “Guiding Light” is still a set touchstone, accented by a romanticism so earnest it makes you uncomfortable to be seen anywhere near a performance of it. That’s the Mumford effect — a gooey center devoid of pretension that can easily attach itself to any rote memories and create meaning in the mind.

It’s 2015 and I am vacuuming the gross carpet I’ve since replaced with that moonbeam laminate flooring from Home Depot that all millennials install and. … Oh God, it’s the very carpet my now-deceased cat Winston would always puke on.

And then you get melancholy. All it takes is this tender man repeating the phrase “I don’t even know if I believe.”

“There’s no other festival in the world that we’ve headlined three times,” Mumford said. “And that makes it our favorite festival in the world.”

Just before fan-fave “The Cave,” he added that this tour was somewhat accidental. They kept saying yes to one-off gigs, ACL Fest included, and suddenly the band was on the road again. Mumford teased new music after these engagements, by the way. But many patrons took the 2009 track as their cue to file out with 45 minutes of music left to go — even a guy in a Mumford & Sons T-shirt dipped.

Mumford was losing them — which is perhaps why the band relocated to a platform situated above the sound stage. They tried to harmonize “Timshel” but fellow headliner Odesza’s uncompromising electronic music, heard blaring across the park, overpowered the idea.

Atop the platform, Mumford invited ACL standout Noah Kahan onstage to perform a newly written song, joking that they’d rehearsed it together only that afternoon.

Then Mumford and friends hit the reset button and took it back to the title track and intro of 2009’s breakout “Sigh No More.” Backed by the Huston-Tillotson Concert Choir, it was another pay-dirt local nod that proved stirring and ambitious.

“Singing in a room with this lot is absolutely one of the highlights of my year,” Mumford said.

Then they closed with “I Will Wait,” a song I greatly dislike that plays rapturous at ACL every time.

See you next year, Marcus.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Mumford & Sons close ACL Fest Weekend One with tender feels and lasers