Mumford & Sons Announce Third Album ‘Wilder Mind’

March 3, 2015

British folk-rockers Mumford & Sons are leaving their banjo-loving selves behind on their third studio album, Wilder Mind, which is set for release this May.

Recorded in London and produced by the great James Ford (Arctic Monkeys, HAIM, Florence & The Machine), Wilder Mind features 12 new tracks which mark a departure from the more acoustic sounds of 2009’s Sigh No More and 2012’s Babel. A number of the songs on the album were written and demoed at the studios of The National’s Aaron Dessner, in Brooklyn.

Marcus Mumford describes Wilder Mind as “a development, not a departure”, which almost came about by accident.

“Towards the end of the Babel tour, we’d always play new songs during soundchecks, and none of them featured the banjo, or a kick-drum. And demoing with Aaron [Dessner] meant that, when we took a break, we knew it wasn’t going to involve acoustic instruments,” Mumford says.

“We didn’t say: ‘No acoustic instruments.’ But I think all of us had this desire to shake it up. The songwriting hasn’t changed drastically; it was led more by a desire to not do the same thing again. Plus, we fell back in love with drums! It’s as simple as that.”

Mumford’s bandmate Ben Lovett says the shift in sound wasn’t at all forced, and flowed freely during rehearsals.

“It felt completely natural, though, like it did when we started out,” says Lovett. “It was very much a case of, if someone was playing an electric guitar, drums were going to complement that best; and, sonically, it then made sense to add a synth or an organ. We chose instruments that played well off each other, rather than consciously trying to overhaul it.”

In some extra good news for Aussie fans, Mumford & Sons are expected to play select dates in Australia towards the end of this year.

Wilder Mind will be released in Australia on 1st May 2015. The band are yet to share any material from the album. View the album artwork and tracklisting, below.