Mumford and Sons rolled into Minnesota on September 4th for a hyped-up and completely sold out performance at the Excel Energy Center. The band opened with well-received acts from Gill Landry, Bear’s Den, and The Vaccines. I don’t usually consider myself much of a Mumford fan, but the concert was— not to sound cliché— magical. There’s just something about being on the floor, no more than sixty feet away from the stage, vibing to “Little Lion Man” with a bunch of middle-aged and sweaty people, that has a Disney-esque ambiance about it.
All jokes aside, Mumford was amazing. Without seeing them in concert it is hard to understand how incredibly musically talented the group is. According to my more cultured friend, throughout the concert Mumford and Sons was “four-chord harmonizing,” which apparently takes nearly super-human vocal chords. Believe me there was not a trace of auto-tune or lip-syncing at this gig.
Furthermore, Mumford threw themselves into each song with an energy that radiated out to the crowd and whipped everyone into a euphoric frenzy, especially during their signature guitar-twanging maelstroms. Most notably during “Dust Bowl Dance,” Marcus Mumford was so into the song that he threw the drum set and then proceeded to drop the microphone, much to the delight of the crowd.
The group talked very little in the beginning of the concert, letting their music do all the introduction that was needed, but as the concert progressed, Marcus Mumford, Country Winston, and Ted Dwane all warmed up to the crowd. By the end, the group talked about anything from “The Mighty Ducks,” (prompting a “quack, quack, quack” chant from the crowd) to their first performance in Minnesota in 2008, when they attracted all of an alleged “twelve people.”
After going through what seemed to be every song in the Mumford and Sons repertoire, I thought the concert would never end and I would be able to enjoy this musical heaven forever. Unfortunately, it was not to be, but even so, Mumford went out with a bang.
For an encore they discretely switched to a previously unnoticed stage on the other side of the floor, prompting a mad rush to get the best view. The band crowded around a singular microphone/light contraption, and sang two quieter songs. With the light reflecting off the band-members’ faces, it gave the appearance of the group huddling around a campfire, which accentuated the group’s folksy roots.
Then, the band ran back to the main-stage and invited all of the preceding bands to the stage to do a cover of the Beatles, “Come Together.” This was by far my favorite part of the night. The atmosphere in that moment was indescribable, everyone in the audience was singing along and every musician on stage was smiling with genuine happiness. That moment, to me, encapsulated everything that music should be. Finally, Mumford and Sons closed with a raucous, fist-pumping encore of “Little Lion Man,” which was a perfect ending to the night.
