Photo: Press
Mumford & Sons have spoken out about their change of musical direction for their third studio album Wilder Mind - in particular, the lack of banjo.
In the new issue of Q Magazine, the band explain why they decided to modify the sound that made them, ditching banjos and country parapenelia in favour of guitars.
“It wasn’t ‘fuck the banjo’ at all,” says Winston Marshall. “We just did whatever we wanted, musically. We always thought of ourselves as a rock band playing folk instruments. Although we might be completely deluded!”
Below: Watch the official video for Mumford & Sons 'The Wolf'
The band have also discussed how they have evolved their look. “We always took the music seriously,” declares Marshall, “but we dressed like bloody clowns!” It echoes their recent statements to NME in which keyboardist Ben Lovett declared: “I think it would be fair to say that we’ve noticed that in some of our old photos we look like absolute idiots. There were so many car crashes. We look like us in our photos now. I don’t even want to describe how we used to look.”
Mumford & Sons are the third headliners or this year's Reading + Leeds festivals, alongside The Libertines and Metallica. For Reading tickets visit here, and for Leeds tickets visit here.
They also are playing a Scottish date of their Gentlemen Of The Road tour at Aviemore on 31 July featuring support from Ben Howard, Primal Scream, The Maccabees, Simian Mobile Disco. Lianne La Havas, Jack Garratt, King Charles and Honeyblood. For tickets and information, visit here.
Read our investigation on whether it's possible to talk about the new Mumford & Sons album without mentioning the word 'banjo' here.
