Pre-Festival Concert #2

The second concert was a newer favorite: Mumford and Sons.  They have one album out, and every song on it is great (although I suppose I should add the parental language warning about the song Little Lion Man...Do NOT blast this song with kiddos in the house!)  This group hails from London, and the style of music is sort of a bluegrass/Irish/rock concoction.  This concert was at the Hollywood Palladium and was totally sold out and packed.

I'm sorry to say that the openers at this concert were rather dreadful.  In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if I found out that the first opener had been featured on the American Idol rejects.  Not that he had an excruciating voice, just he wrote songs only a mother could love and his whole get-up was simply preposterous.  The second opener was a little better, but still--for a crowd of 4,000 people waiting to see a very talented and popular band, they just weren't up to par.

All was forgiven (though the scars remain) when Mumford and Sons got on stage and said "We hope you enjoyed [the opening bands] as much as we did." [wink, wink]

Anyhow, the performance was great, and it was tons of fun to hear thousands of people singing along to some great songs.  The four guys in the group are all great musicians, playing a variety of instruments: drums, keyboard, guitar, upright bass, accordion, banjo, mandolin.  The song where the lead singer was also drumming, and the bass player was playing while holding the upright bass above his head left me amazed.