Believe

The harmony is straightforward major-key rock — no modal borrowing, no extended chords, no jazz substitutions. James Ellis Ford's production places the emotional weight on dynamics and arrangement rather than harmonic complexity: the same chords that feel sparse in the verse feel enormous in the chorus because of what is layered on top. For a band that had previously built texture through acoustic counterpoint, 'Believe' shows them learning to do the same thing with electric volume.

Written collectively by all four members of Mumford & Sons during the Wilder Mind sessions, 'Believe' came out of a deliberate band-wide decision to shed the acoustic instruments that had defined Sigh No More and Babel. Rather than one member driving the new direction, the whole group worked through what they sounded like plugged in, leaning into influences from classic rock and contemporary British alternative acts.

'Believe' arrived in March 2015 as an early signal that Mumford & Sons had fundamentally changed. Part of Wilder Mind, the record that deliberately abandoned the band's folk instrumentation, it pairs Marcus Mumford's earnest delivery with a full electric rock arrangement shaped by producer James Ellis Ford. All four members share the writing credit, and the result sounds like a band deciding collectively to start over.