On Friday, April 22, 2016 I attended my first Mumford & Sons concert. This was a concert I have been looking forward to since I first heard "Sigh No More" back in early 2010. I must first confess that I am a diehard Mumford fan. In fact, they have been my favorite band since that very first listen. They weren’t an acquired taste for me, they stuck immediately.
Why did I wait six whole years to see them you ask? Well, I tried, alright? I’ve been rained out, had dates moved, and was then unable to go on the new date, and I moved into college the day after their first visit to my area. So I’ve tried, I really have, but it just wasn’t not in the cards.
All this time, I’ve been building it up in my head. It’s an understatement to say that my expectations were unreasonably high. I knew the lyrics to every song including the obscure ones. I had listened to them nearly every day for the past six years, and finally the time was here, in the standing room, 30 feet from the stage.
The Alliant Energy Center was definitely an interesting venue, and at 22,000 square feet and over 10,000 spectator capacity, is quite a large one for a band that was initially known for their banjo and a folksy style. However, with their ever increasing popularity and their third album’s loss of the banjo and addition of electric guitars, the band seemed very at home in the stadium setting.
The demographic of the audience was not overly diverse, with mostly people in their late 20s to early 30s, with a few younger and older mixed in. My friends and I, all about 21 years old, were among the youngest in our area of the crowd.
After the opening band, which lacked any sense of audience interaction or a sound naturally powerful enough to fill the entire stadium, Mumford seemed like a natural headlining stadium-rock band. Their very first song, “Snake Eyes," from their latest album "Wilder Mind," immediately consumed the crowd.
Mumford managed to not only recreate their studio songs, but enhance them. Perhaps their greatest attribute as live performers is their ability to make some of their most popular (overplayed) songs, such as "The Cave" from their firsta album "Sigh No More," almost original. Their performance was not one of simply recreating the studio versions of their songs, it was one of enhancing every song with creativity and originality. I overheard a couple right behind me who had attended their show the previous night in St. Louis say, "They didn't do that last night!" more than once. It made me feel good to hear that the band changes it up every night, keeping it fresh and fun instead of giving in to the monotony of playing every single night for months. This is the mark of not only talented musicians, but good band chemistry.
The ensemble played a 21 song setlist, including one first-time performance of a track from their new mini-album, an acoustic number from their early days, and one lap of the Alliant Energy Center by Marcus Mumford.
If there was one odd part of the concert, it was that it's hard to know what to do at a Mumford & Sons concert. Isn't the idea of jumping up and down while there is a banjo playing just a little strange? Some of the audience just screamed the lyrics, some danced the whole time, and others just bumped into everyone around them uncontrollably. All I know is that my voice was gone afterward.
They say you should never meet your heroes, but as a Mumford & Sons fan(atic) with unreasonably high expectations, I give my seal of approval.
