SOMERVILLE — The mostly millennial crowd was wiggle-room only: Hundreds were packed shoulder to shoulder, bracing beers and hard seltzers beneath a blazing sun.
Could they see Guster — the cult, Boston-bred indie rockers — making their much-hyped Porchfest debut Saturday afternoon? No. Could they hear them? Also no.
It was a scene unlike any other at the annual outdoor music showcase, drawing a massive swell of people, their babies, and their pets at the intersection of Cedar Street and Aberdeen Road. The best seats belonged to a couple of plucky fans, who watched the band while perched between the branches of a large tree. And 25-year-old Hadi Kobaissi, a 6′5″ Malden resident, who, from his view several hundred people-deep from the porch where Guster was playing, had eyes on the four-man band at 12 Aberdeen.
It’s a pity, he added, that he has the “worst ears.”
“That’s the trade-off,” Kobaissi said.
“I’ve heard about as much Guster music as I heard before now, which is none of it,” his friend, 30-year-old Andy Cawley, quipped.
“This,” she added, eyeing the the size of the crowd, “is new.”
Guster, the band behind hits such as “Satellite” and “Amsterdam,” is the most high-profile act to ever play in the festival in recent years, according to Rachel Strutt, program manager of the Somerville Arts Council, which puts on the citywide event. Their brief appearance at Porchfest, where they performed a 30-minute set, came two months after playing before a packed house at MGM Fenway.
It was a homecoming of sorts for Guster. The band performed less than 200 feet from their old stomping grounds at 33 Aberdeen Road, where they lived for three years. The band’s members met in 1991 while studying at Tufts University in Medford. They wrote much of their third album “Lost and Gone Forever” at the four-bedroom Somerville apartment in the 1990s.
Guster singer Ryan Miller told the Globe earlier this week that the band’s time living and making music in Somerville were “fundamental [and] formative.” He said the band had been toying around with the idea of performing at Porchfest for years.
“We had always kind of thought that this would be a fun thing to do if we could ever work it out,” Miller told the Globe.
For tried and true Guster lovers, navigating the mob of spectators was worth it. David Kilstein, 30, and his girlfriend, Leah Gaffney, 31, both of Cambridge, are self-described “hardcore Guster fans” who grew up listening to Guster and bonded over their shared passion for the band. They came to Porchest specifically to see Guster, driving back home early from a graduation party in Providence so they could make it to the show.
Kilstein, “a classic music snob who ascribes to the greater Pitchfork universe of music” said Guster embodies ‘90s nostalgia. Growing up, he shared a room with his brother; the first record they bought together was “Lost and Gone Forever.”
“We listened to it every night to go to sleep for like a year,” he said. “It’s an album I literally learned every lick of, cover to cover.”
Twenty-six-year-old Abe Laxague, of Brighton, was also a little wistful watching Guster perform. He recorded the band, lifting his phone high above his head, while singing along to “Amsterdam.” When he heard Guster was playing a set at Porchfest, Laxague knew he had to attend even if it meant listening “on the outskirts.” His father, who died of cancer in 2020, introduced Laxague to “Amsterdam” when he was a kid.
“It’s very sentimental to me,” he said. “Seeing them here, live, is something I never expected. And I’m so grateful for it.”
Guster’s much-anticipated next album, “Ooh La La,” their first in five years, drops May 17.
Deanna Pan can be reached at deanna.pan@globe.com. Follow her @DDpan.