Austin City Limits Festival

It’s almost been two weeks since Weekend Two of the Austin City Limits Music Festival came to a close, and it was once again another stellar year. It was still a bit warm in Austin, but luckily it started to cool off on Sunday. The Festival made a few layout changes from last year, which proved very successful. The new setup gave more room to move around, as one stage extended across Barton Springs Road. We also saw the most diversity in bands playing in terms of weekend one vs. weekend two (at least in our humble opinions)

If you’ve never been to the Austin City Limits Festival, we highly recommend going. Austin is a really cool town that has earned the distinction as the music capital of the world with one of the best festivals on the planet. As proof, today we share a myriad of photos and some of our favorite performances caught during ACL (Mostly from the earlier acts, of course Foster The People , Portugal The Man, The XX and Spoon were awesome – we have those photos to share). Many of the bands are the ones that were on our list to see, but we also had a few that we happened upon and surprised us. Of course, there are photos of super well-known bands and a few lesser known ones.

In addition to those cover below, more photos are provided in the slider. There you will find pics of Portugal. The Man, Run the Jewels, Whitney, Rainbow Kitten Surprise, Benjamin Booker, The Black Angels, Spoon, Pumarosa, Glass Animals, Lemon Twigs, OAR, Martin Garrix, Foster the People, and The xx.

All professional photos courtesy of our Austin photographer Gabe Guevara.

Angel Olsen

Angel Olsen brought style, class and talent to ACL, and it was a pleasure to watch her classic and timeless vocals come to life in a live setting. She is a great entertainer and definitely one to check out on tour if you are able to make it.

Billy Raffoul

We have shared tracks previously from Billy Raffoul. The Canadian only has two singles released to date, but by the sounds of his new material played at ACL, it’s only a matter of time before more fans discover his talent. The 22-year old is compared to Joe Cocker and Jeff Buckley.

The Band of Heathens

It is always a great live experience to witness Austin-based The Band of Heathens. Their live set was energetic and impressive as they shared tracks from their recently released album, Duende. You can currently find them on tour here.

Car Seat Headrest

Car Seat Headrest brought personality on stage with their unique style of lo-fi pop. Will Toledo brandished a pretty awesome pair of spectacles on stage and played many tracks from Teens of Denial.

COIN

COIN offered up high energy and great stage presence for their addictive blend of indie pop. The band played many tunes from their album How Will You Know If You Never Try, including the earworm “Talk Too Much”.

Day Wave

Day Wave has been creating dreamy indie-pop tunes mostly under the radar. The solo project of Jackson Phillips came with a full band to ACL and provided a flawless presentation of tracks from his debut album, The Days We Had.

DREAMERS

DREAMERS did not disappoint. The band could have easily played on a bigger stage, as their crowd was quite large for their time slot and location. The band played songs from their album, This Album Does Not Exist, and provided a super high-energy set, including the ultra catchy “Sweet Disaster”. They have a few upcoming tour dates here.

First Aid Kit

The Swedish sister duo were unstoppable on stage. As their live set continued to unfold, you just ended up loving them even more. The duo will have a few US tour dates in early 2018. Highly recommend catching them live if you can.

Milky Chance

Milky Chance had a really great live set and brought some of their newest songs from their Blossom album to life. They also perfectly delivered some of their super popular tracks from their previous release, Sadneccessary. They have a massive tour in support of the new album, so you can catch them this fall and into 2018 here.

MISSIO

Austin-based MISSIO always bring energy and heart to their live shows. After catching them live at SXSW earlier this year, we have been keeping tabs on the duo, whose fan base continues to grow. With songs that tackle real life issues, specifically Matthew chronicles his own struggles with addiction and depression, the ultimate message from a band whose name means “Mission” is you are never alone.

Mondo Cozmo

Mondo Cozmo recently released Plastic Soul earlier this year and each track played from the album was flawlessly delivered in a live setting. If you can ever catch this band live, do it.

Ought

It’s always nice to see Ought in a live setting because frontman Tim Darcy is something you do not want to miss. He has a stage presence that is undeniable and it was nice to hear both old and new track from their most recent release Sun Coming Down.

Songhoy Blues

Songhoy Blues was on our original list to see but we were quite blown away at the energy level of the band from Timbuktu and also their sheer talent being so passionately displayed on stage. They are about to embark on a UK tour – dates available here.

Striking Matches

We stumbled upon Striking Matches and this picture does not do the duo justice. They are both accomplished guitar players and the duo of Sarah Zimmerman and Justin Davis play well off of each other with a playful competitiveness on stage and the use of dual vocals.

TEN FÉ

TEN FÉ delivered a solid set and it’s always great to attend festivals like ACL to see some of the talented bands from overseas perform. The UK band played some of their best tracks live including “Elodie” and “Another Way”.