Mumford & Sons bring nostalgia and surprises to BST Hyde Park
The London locals were joined by Hozier and Shania Twain to make it a memorable night.
Photo: @bethanmillerco
It had been a long time coming when we arrived at Hyde Park to finally see a band I’d loved and grown up with since 2010. I wouldn’t describe banjos and folk twang as my usual music taste, but Mumford & Sons are a band that have transcended the boundaries of their genre and gained millions of fans around the world who would most likely describe them as ‘not their usual taste’ too. There’s just something about the band's enthusiastic foot-stomping and lyrical charm that wins you over.
It seemed fitting that the evening reached golden hour just as the familiar face of frontman Marcus Mumford appeared, alongside original members Ted Dwane and Ben Lovett and their polished live band. Marcus, a London local himself, put it best: “I swear there’s nothing like Hyde Park on a sunny summer’s day”. In that moment, it would have been hard for anyone to argue with him.
They kicked off the nineteen-song setlist with Begin Again, a track from their most recent album, Prizefighter. The new album might not pack the same punch as their earlier work, but Begin Again proved to be a great opener, starting the evening with a joyful energy that carried throughout the set.
Surprising everyone with an early crowd-pleaser, they followed up with I Will Wait; a song that hardly needs any introduction. If you were around in 2012, then you couldn’t escape it. With furious strumming, thumping drums and bright banjos, the song was brought back to life by Mumford and co., who proved it’s still an anthemic hit fit for the big stage.
White Blank Page proved to be an unexpected highlight; a track that, like a lot of Mumford & Sons songs, explores a whole depth of emotions within the space of a few minutes. It begins with a heartbroken, self-doubting voice but builds to anger as the story continues along the theme of betrayal. It made for a cathartic singalong.
Marcus swapped the front of the stage for the drums on the next song, and I knew it was time for one of my all-time favourites. Babel is an album I used to listen to with my grandparents, and Lover Of The Light particularly takes me back to car journeys when my grandad would put on the CD. Hearing it live was just as euphoric as hearing the song for the first time and feeling, as the music video encapsulates, like you’re free.
Hopeless Wanderer flew by in a blur of chaotic strumming before the first guest, Stella Lefty, emerged for a sweet rendition of the tender track Badlands, which originally features Gracie Abrams.
The second guest of the evening was a familiar face and another artist who shaped my formative music years: Hozier. The band and “the kindest man in music” (as described by Marcus) joined forces for Rubber Band Man and gave a spirited performance of the song they recorded together.
Photo: @bethanmillerco
His guest appearance didn’t end there, as the well-loved Irish singer stayed on stage to duet with Marcus on an old favourite, Awake My Soul. The pair shone on the more stripped-back track as they took turns singing the opening verses, with nothing but a gentle guitar melody allowing their voices to resonate through the warm summer air.
As Hozier left to an approving roar, the band dove into Truth from their 2025 album RUSHMERE. It wasn’t a song I was as familiar with, but it featured fewer banjos, more electric guitars and plenty of pyrotechnics: you could feel a shift in gear as the sky began to darken.
Ditmus kept the energy high, building up to one of the most popular songs of the night: Little Lion Man. I wouldn’t be surprised if the chorus could be heard from the other side of London, as everyone belted out the well-known lines “It was not your fault but mine, and it was your heart on the line / I really fucked it up this time, didn’t I, my dear?”.
After rousing renditions of Believe, Delta and The Wolf, the band left for a brief respite before coming back out to start off the five-song encore with RUSHMERE.
Then came the big shock of the night. Marcus announced that there was “another cheeky surprise” and introduced someone he described as a personal hero. If you’d asked me to guess who was walking out, it would have taken me a hundred tries to get it right: the queen of country-pop herself, Shania Twain, came running onto the stage to screams of delight. Shania had opened for Harry Styles at Wembley Stadium earlier that evening before racing across London to make it for her second show of the evening in Hyde Park. And we’re very glad she did.
She had great onstage chemistry with the band as they came together for Here, a song from their most recent album, recorded with American country singer Chris Stapleton. Shania put her own stamp on the track with signature vocals and infectious stage presence.
Not thinking it could get any better, the night was then topped off as the iconic opening riff of Man! I Feel Like A Woman! rang out through the park. The band’s reaction pretty much summed up how we all felt in that moment, dancing across the stage to a song that makes standing still virtually impossible.
After such a high, The Banjo Song didn’t hit quite the same high notes, but it led nicely into the final song of the night: The Cave. It felt fitting to close on the song that made me discover the band back in 2010, watching music channels on TV as a youngster. Despite leaving everything on stage, the band still had the energy to make it a special conclusion to a very special night.
The band put on a set worthy of celebrating ten years since their last headline show at the London festival. The older, more acoustic songs mixed surprisingly well with an array of fresher, new songs. Although, as a big fan of their first few albums, the kid in me would have liked to hear a few more of the old classics like Sigh No More or Whispers In The Dark. But you can’t have everything. And, with the high standard of performance and calibre of guests, there wasn’t much to complain about.
