Marcus Mumford features new solo songs, plus a Taylor Swift surprise, at ACL Fest

"I'm going to play a Taylor Swift song for three reasons," Marcus Mumford announced about halfway through his hourlong set at the Austin City Limits Music Festival just after sundown on Sunday. "One, Taylor Swift's awesome. Two, it's a great song. And three, I sang on it, so I think I'm entitled."

"Cowboy Like Me," a song from Swift's 2020 album "Evermore" that features a vocal cameo from Mumford, proved to be a smart and well-received addition to the set. He'd left about 8 minutes on the clock during the festival's first weekend, so there was room for more. And it seemed appropriate to do something special for the event Mumford called "my favorite festival in the whole of North America."

Building the set list for his current tour, the first he's done without his massively popular British band Mumford & Sons, was kind of like flipping the script on expectations. Mumford recently released a "solo" album, but he noted that it was in fact one of the most collaborative recordings he's ever done, featuring several guest singers and co-writers.

He also was wary of playing Mumford & Sons songs with the band on his current tour: He didn't want to give the wrong impression that Mumford & Sons have split up, which they definitely haven't. So he played the solo-album stuff with a band, while performing a few Mumford & Sons favorites as solo acoustic numbers.

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It worked well. Mumford drew in fans who'd likely seen Mumford & Sons headline ACL Fest in 2016 and 2019 with splendidly intimate renditions of "Awake My Soul" and "The Cave" before shifting gears and bringing out his backing crew for six tunes from the new album.

The second of those, "Grace," features a compelling vocal contribution from soulful singer Danielle Ponder, who recently opened a string of shows for Mumford and performed early-afternoon sets on both Sundays of ACL Fest. So, it was easy to recruit her for a guest appearance. She returned near the end of the set for a duet on "When I Get My Hands on You" from 2014's all-star affair "Lost on the River: The New Basement Tapes."

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Mumford played six of the 10 songs on his new album; he played seven last week and has been doing the whole thing from start to finish at most tour stops, but the shorter festival-length set required some trimming. Along with the Swift addition, a good call for Weekend 2 was swapping the new album's "Go in Light" for a solo acoustic "I Will Wait," perhaps Mumford & Sons' best-known song and one that fans clearly appreciated hearing on Sunday.

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Soon enough, Mumford & Sons will be back in the studio and on the road together. When we spoke to Mumford by phone a week before the festival, he confirmed that they expect to start working on a new project next year. In the meantime, though, ACL Fest got something special with the chance to hear this new record — and even a Taylor Swift song to boot.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Marcus Mumford plays new songs and a Taylor Swift tune at ACL Fest