ACL Live Shot: Mac DeMarco

Clad in a grungy, plaid flannel shirt with a mop of listless bedhead, the gap-toothed slack rocker didn’t look like the conventional heartthrob. Nevertheless, girls squealed with delight as he strolled onstage. “I’m Mac,” he waved. “Now, we’re friends.”

“Cooking Up Something Good,” from his 2012 sophomore LP under his own name, 2, opened the afternoon set. DeMarco later spotlighted songs from April’s lo-fi gem Salad Days with “Blue Boy,” “Brother,” and “Chamber of Reflection.” Yet it was another tune from two years ago that spoke to the singer’s duality and growing audience.

“I’m a man,” the now-Brooklynite swore in the Rock and Roll Night Club closer – also from 2012.

From a 24-year-old musician, the lyric technically rings true. Still, the British Columbia native, who employed both his mic and water bottle as phallic props during an hour-long ACL Fest set, continues acting like a disarmingly vulgar punk kid. “Sexy,” he kidded, exposing his bare potbelly on the Jumbotron.

Midway through his quartet’s performance, a front-row fan wielding a sign that read “Mac, let me play lead on ‘[Ode to] Viceroy’” got his wish.

“Might as well,” reasoned DeMarco, inviting the hopeful guitarist onstage. “Let’s see if the boy can shred!”

Turns out, “the boy” could shred. In fact, he played along so flawlessly – solo and all – that touring guitarist Andrew White joked about possibly losing his job.

“Here’s another love song, big surprise,” DeMarco jested before ending with “Still Together,” once again impishly grabbing at his crotch. Afterward, he plopped down his mic and jumped into the pit, crowd-surfing through every inch of the pack while playing air-drums. He worked his way back onstage again for a final farewell, Mac style.

“Thanks for hangin’ out! Okie-dokie!!”

Thank you, my man.