Free Mumford and Sons.

In 2015 Mumford and Sons went electric.

After massively successful debut and sophomore albums, the British neo-folk rock band that stomped and banjo-plucked their way to the music industry's heights decided on a new direction, and asked their fans to trust them on this journey. But amid the weeping and gnashing of teeth, distant wails of "where's the banjo?" and clockwork dismissals by industry critics, it wasn't a happy journey. As I wrote in an earlier blog post, Wilder Mind was a perfectly charming rock album, but in the shadow of the folk revival M+S helped engineer it paled in comparison for many, and perhaps a majority of, fans.

Three and a half years later their newest album, Delta, strays even further from the original formula, almost as if fealty to music's possibilities and group evolution is more important to them than glowing reviews. And again, the reception is middling at best. So have M+S officially lost their way, tone-deaf to the quality of the magic they used to make? Or is there possibly another explanation?

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Sigh No More and Babel are the M+S acoustic albums, and share plenty in common: four-part harmonies, furiously syncopated guitar strumming, dramatic crescendos, excellent hooks, grandiose lyrics, and a very abused kick drum. M+S, in their old-timey vests and hats, were peddling a populist new folk that dispensed with the regional intricacies that often make historical folk difficult to penetrate.

It helps to place these albums in the context of the larger musical landscape of the late-aughts and early teens. It may be hard to remember a time when music was quiet, but singer-songwriters dominated the 2000s, and Colbie Caillat, Jason Mraz, Regina Spektor, Glen Hansard, Corinne Bailey Rae, and dozens of their contemporaries specialized in quirky, even Gallic sounds and ruminations. When Mumford and Sons and fellow British act Florence + the Machine came screaming onto the world stage in 2009, they woke everyone up. Music became big, epic, vast - everyone from Lady Gaga to Fun. to Kings of Leon to Beyonce to OK Go to Katy Perry to Sia got in on the game.

When M+S debuted, what they were doing was fresh and exciting by 21st century standards. Their stage name sounded appropriately hipster-vintage, their album cover was inscrutably indifferent, and their carefully curated look ran directly parallel to the elder Millennial men with their silly mustaches and just-burgeoning beards. Fans amassed in veritable hordes. Small-venue concerts sold out. Music festivals were abuzz. Babel was released in 2012 and was exactly more of the same; the boys won Album of the Year at the Grammys (partly to make up for them not winning Best New Artist previously). The love affair was solidified.

And then came that moment when every musical act has to decide where to go from there - risk criticism for sticking with the formula, or risk criticism for trying something new? Take your pick! I say very confidently that M+S fans would have been blissfully content with a third album of exactly more of the same, and critics would have chided them for playing it safe while still paying homage to their legacy which is the most anyone can ask for.

So they mindfully chose moving in a new direction.



When you sit down and really compare Sigh No More and Babel, in hindsight it's quite clear that "going electric" was inevitable. The raucous debut is heavy, almost ponderous in places, the more thematically meditative of the two, thick with harmonies, backed in spots by a vivid brass section. Listening back the band almost seems to take itself too seriously.

Babel is brighter, catchier, more carefully plotted while sticking, as I've said, with what worked. But there is a great sense of urgency in many of the songs - "Hopeless Wanderer" and "I Will Wait" as just two examples - in which you can feel their subconscious desire to break free of their own conventions. The songs are more consistently rhythmic and in a few places Marcus Mumford's vocals are so furious they overpower the already full-throated instruments. There's a bit of experimentation - you hear a sampling of electric guitar in the background here and there, and the climax of "Below My Feet" is swaddled in reverb. From there it's not a huge philosophical leap to Wilder Mind.

If you segue from Babel to Wilder Mind immediately, the first thing you notice about the latter is how little it weighs. The strenuous acoustic strumming and kick drumming and key pounding has been replaced by effortless streams of amplified sound and a regular drum kit. On upbeat jams Marcus is able to sing at fortepiano which allows for nuance and shifting emotion. The album overall, at the very first listen, seems sapped of the energy that made the group famous.

It's only when you listen again, and with a little more attention, that you become acclimated to the new style and realize almost everything that worked for M+S before is still there. Melody, or more technically melodicism, has always been their strong suit; rarely does a line fall tunelessly or a chorus fail to resolve in a way that is relieving. There is a reason certain songwriters are always in demand in the industry - composing a satisfying tune is as easy for them as is the sketch to the artist or the stanza to the poet. Without appreciating the ability of M+S to continually compose legitimate, creative, many times beautiful melodies, I can see that it would be difficult to stick with them through style changes.

They are also known for their harmonies, which are there but a bit muted (in fact, I have a beef with the sound mixing in that regard), and this is where it helps for the fan to have a musical bent. Even when the boys aren't harmonizing, the melody is most of the time still harmonize-able. There is no end to the possibly shitty melodic progressions that fail to support any harmonic flow whatsoever; harmony is not just something that happens. You have to know how to write for it, and M+S do. So even when it's just Marcus singing, I still can hear the harmony in my head and even hum it if I want. Without that sort of ear or knowledge of basic music theory, I can see someone complaining about "the harmonies" being gone, and they don't entirely not have a point.

With a few more spins you realize the soul of M+S is planted firmly in the center of Wilder Mind, and it is a tribute to their musicianship that they held on to their foundations will making such a swerve. One thing I think about sometimes is how different the experience of a song is when you've written/learned it, and memorized it, and perfected it, and performed it multiple times before anyone outside the studio (or, aherm, band room) hears it. It is an altogether different creature, it is in some way a part of you even in the most banal sense; it is not the same song as if you were only to hear it performed by someone else one time.

I think M+S experienced a lot of that with their third album, really crafting and honing until the songs, in their bones, were beasts that no one outside their bubble could tame without patience. So it's a pity that many fans dropped the album from their rotation after one half-hearted spin. (It's an even bigger pity that music reviews still get written and published based on such half-heartedness, and you can't tell me there aren't people out there writing reviews based on iTunes song previews)

Apparently unfazed by the critics and perhaps knowing their own worth, three years later and right on time M+S debuted their fourth album, Delta.

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This time around the band has both dipped back into their acoustic past and reached forward to the immediate moment to capture the possibilities of synth pop and electronica, ultimately creating a constellated sound able to stretch in multiple directions, to great effect.

The album leads off with the provocatively-titled "42," opening with nothing but their classic harmonies and an organ before building, in intensity and instrumentation, toward climactic wails and reverb. I think the almost hymnal tone it begins with not only suggests a winking reverence for their old days, but foreshadows what is lyrically quite a faintly religious album (not getting into that, though).

Stylistically it's a cleverly neutral way to kick things off, and from there the album utilizes four main sounds: generalized folk-rock ("Beloved," "Slip Away," "Guiding Light"), synth-pop ("Woman," "Rose of Sharon," "Picture You"), experimental ("Darkness Visible," If I Say"), and rustic ("The Wild," "October Skies," "Wild Heart"). Each category has its strengths.

"Beloved" and "Slip Away" are two of the most upbeat songs (in an album that admittedly struck me as pretty slow the first few spins), with "Beloved" being a true standout. From the cool syncopated banjo to the outstanding hook and driving beat to the acoustic breakdowns, the song exemplifies what M+S do best whether there's a kick drum or not. The lyrics border on grandiose but is that a reference to the myth of Osiris I hear?? Automatic win.

"Rose of Sharon" also uses a syncopated banjo line and throws in some urban beats, and then "Picture You" instantly one-ups it by being pure synth-pop. And it sounds amazing, with the tight production, crunchy beats and squeaky sound manipulation we've come to expect from established acts who suffer no neo-folk background. In an interview, Marcus Mumford expressed delight that they could (he felt) legitimately do an entirely electronic album and at this point it wouldn't seem strange; he may be right.

"If I Say" is in my opinion the thematic climax of the album, arriving right after the electronic wall-of-sound of "Darkness Visible" that is their most experimental moment. "If I Say" uses a shifting tonal center to great effect, along with eerie flares of 80s synth, mournful cello, and a small drum breakdown a la Phil Collins (naturally). The chords are picked apart and strung throughout each measure until becoming almost Moroder-esque in the final crescendo. More than any of the preceding songs I just feel it to be the moment that M+S lets us know they are committed to growth, rather than nostalgia.

"Wild Heart" is reminiscent of the great Ray LaMontagne joint "Empty" with its old troubadour sound laid over a Spanish influence; "The Wild" has a quiet first half, its soundscape benefiting from background synth accompaniment to a plucked acoustic line, and the second half is an orchestral, cinematic crescendo. "Forever" sounds so much like Simon and Garfunkel that I think it's an attempt at recreating The Boxer, and the lyrics especially nod to Paul Simon's writing style; it's inoffensive but underwhelming, at at 15 songs they could have made it a bonus track.

As I mentioned, the album on first spin struck me as earnest but slow and quiet, which now seems so strange because there are plenty of tracks with drive and energy and the whole set list is nicely balanced. Perhaps your brain only picks up on (what to you are) the most striking facets of an album and from that weaves a first impression that could be hard to shake; I didn't really tune in to "Beloved" and "Picture You" and "Guiding Light" until at least the fifth spin, possibly because the quiet moments are truly a first for a band whose calling card used to be volume. To me this is another reason albums should not be reviewed based on a single impression, and while I have no proof, I believe that's where a lot of disappointment with M+S comes from in both fans and critics.

To me, Delta is a fourth triumph for Mumford and Sons and eight months after its release I can still listen to it all the way through, and then start it right back up again, no problem.

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One of the reviews of Delta I read was just a guy ranting "they can't write songs!" for five or six paragraphs. It was one of the more biased reviews of a work of art that I've read, and while I assume his post was an inconsequential blip in an inconsequential online magazine (hence the zero journalistic standards it offers), it weirdly encapsulates many people's emotional response toward M+S. And I do mean emotional, because as I hope I've shown, standard accusations of them somehow not being quality singers, songwriters or musicians have no basis in reality.