From muddy trails at Zilker Park to standout performances by rising artists, Weekend One of the 2026 Austin City Limits Music Festival celebrated 25 years of unforgettable music, exciting discoveries, and memorable moments.

There are certain things you expect when heading into ACL Fest. Long walks across Zilker Park, tough decisions between artists playing at the same time, overpriced food and drinks, and at least one band you barely knew on Friday becoming a new favorite by Sunday night.

This year, you could add mud to the list.

A lot of mud.

Weekend One of the 2026 Austin City Limits Music Festival arrived after days of rain in Austin, and it didn’t take long for thousands of pairs of shoes to turn parts of Zilker Park into something resembling a mud pit. By Sunday, avoiding it was pretty much pointless. You could carefully pick your path for a while, but sooner or later you were going in. Honestly, it became part of the weekend.

ACL celebrated its 25th anniversary this year, bringing another huge lineup to Austin for two weekends of music. As always, the biggest names drew the biggest crowds, but some of the best parts of Weekend One happened earlier in the day and on the smaller stages.

Friday offered a good example with Austin’s Elijah Delgado.

Delgado took the Snapchat Stage early Friday afternoon and was one of the Texas artists worth getting to Zilker early to see. His music has been described as “indie rock lullabies,” which actually makes quite a bit of sense once you hear him live. There is an atmospheric quality to his songs, but they never feel sleepy. His performance was one of those early ACL sets that reminds you why it is worth showing up before the sun starts going down.

Delgado has been building his name around Austin with appearances at Blues on the Green, ACL Radio’s Drop-In series and SXSW, but playing ACL Fest felt like another step forward. There is something especially cool about watching a young Austin artist get his moment on one of the city’s biggest stages.

Friday also provided the first opportunity to wander around and see some of the other things happening throughout the park. One of those stops was the BeatBox Music Mirage, where we picked up passes to the BeatBox Lounge. It was a quick detour in a weekend mostly spent bouncing from stage to stage, but those little stops and discoveries are part of the ACL experience too.

Saturday brought more music, more mud and another artist who deserves some attention.

Fai Laci took the BMI Stage late Saturday afternoon. The BMI Stage has always been one of my favorite places at ACL because you never really know who you’re going to stumble across there. Plenty of artists who have played that little corner of Zilker eventually find themselves on much bigger stages. Fai Laci fit right into that tradition.

While thousands of people were moving across the park toward some of Saturday’s bigger names, the BMI Stage offered a chance to catch an artist still building an audience. Those are often the performances that make festivals like ACL interesting. You may come through the gates with a carefully planned schedule, but sometimes the artist you weren’t planning to see ends up being the one you talk about afterward.

By Saturday evening, however, the condition of Zilker was becoming impossible to ignore.

The rain had softened the ground, and the constant traffic between stages did the rest. Areas that normally serve as highways for festivalgoers became stretches of slick mud. Shoes disappeared ankle deep. People slipped. Others simply gave up trying to stay clean. There was no winning.

By Sunday, the best strategy was to accept that your shoes were not coming home in the same condition they arrived. Fortunately, Sunday also brought one of the strongest stretches of music of the weekend.

West Texas’ Dexter and the Moonrocks took over the American Express Stage during the afternoon, bringing their blend of rock, country and grunge to one of ACL’s biggest stages. The band has described its sound as “Western Space Grunge,” and that’s probably still the easiest way to explain what they do.

The last time Dexter and the Moonrocks appeared at ACL, they played the much smaller BMI Stage in 2024. Two years later, they were standing on the American Express Stage. That’s a pretty good jump.

Their rise also represents something ACL does particularly well. Catch a band on a small stage one year, and a couple of years later you might be watching them play in front of thousands. For a Texas band that has spent the past few years steadily building a following, Sunday’s performance felt like another milestone.

Then came Audrey Hobert.

Hobert was already one of the artists we had circled before the festival, and her Sunday afternoon performance on the T-Mobile Stage justified the anticipation. She has quickly gone from being known primarily as a songwriter and longtime collaborator with Gracie Abrams to establishing her own identity as an artist.

Her clever lyrics, pop hooks and slightly quirky personality translate naturally to a festival crowd. There was also something fun about watching how many people already knew the words. Songs that might feel intimate through headphones suddenly become something entirely different when thousands of people are singing them back.

Hobert’s set was another reminder that some of the most interesting artists at ACL aren’t necessarily the ones whose names sit at the very top of the poster.

That’s probably the biggest takeaway from Weekend One.

Yes, ACL is built around massive headliners. But trying to reduce three days at Zilker Park to a handful of names at the top of the poster misses much of what makes the festival fun.

It’s Elijah Delgado playing an afternoon set in his hometown.

It’s discovering Fai Laci on the BMI Stage.

It’s seeing Dexter and the Moonrocks make the jump from the BMI Stage to American Express.

It’s Audrey Hobert drawing a big Sunday afternoon crowd before the headliners ever take the stage.

And sometimes it’s standing in the middle of Zilker Park, looking down at shoes completely covered in mud and realizing there isn’t much point in trying to avoid the next puddle.

For those heading to Zilker for Weekend Two, make some time between sets to stop by the BeatBox Music Mirage. Festivalgoers have a chance to score passes into the BeatBox Lounge, where you can catch performances, check out some of the other activities and, maybe most importantly after walking around Zilker all day, hang out for a bit before heading back into the festival. 

Weekend One was messy. Very messy.

But after 25 years, ACL Fest has learned that sometimes the weekends people remember most aren’t the perfect ones.

Sometimes they’re the muddy ones.

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Cover Photo Vinnie Fallico

Brian Maass is a native Austinite, writer and photographer covering live music, travel, and culture, with a passion for storytelling through the lens of his camera. He lives in Round Rock with his wife, Dr. Dana Kent Maass, and their rescue dog, Chester. Instagram @brian_maass_adventures.