Of Monsters and Men – Palace Theater – St Paul MN – November 8th 2025

OF MONSTERS AND MEN – PALACE THEATRE – ST PAUL MN – NOV 8TH 2025

Review and photos by Legion Ratfell

Am I the kind of person who will happily go to a show to see one song played live? Yes. I got to see Of Monsters and Men play their second of two shows they played at the Palace Theatre in Saint Paul for The Mouse Parade Tour, supporting their new album “All is Love and Pain in the Mouse Parade.” I will be honest, I only knew one song of theirs going to this show, and that song is “Little Talks” from 2012. But I really love that song, so was excited to see them. I don’t know why I never listened to more of them; I guess there’s just so much music in the world, it can be hard to keep up with sometimes.

Opening the night was Arny Margret, another Icelandic musician. Her set was simple and delicate and beautiful, just her and a reverby guitar. She had a lovely sonorous voice, and though the words blended together a bit, the soundscape she made was very pleasant to listen to. She did break out some harmonica at the end of her set which was nice.

This was Of Monsters and Men’s second show; the first one the night before had sold out, so I wondered how full the Palace would get for night two. Sometimes a second show is added only for that one to be lackluster in numbers. That was not the case for this. Though it was slow to fill up, by the time they went on the Palace was pretty full. Though their stage setup was pretty minimalistic, people were there for the music and that seemed pretty clear. They played songs from a lot of their albums, including “Little Talks,” which was clearly the crowd favorite as well as mine, though I did enjoy their whole set. Lead singers Nanna and Ragnar’s vocals were so well matched, with Ragnar’s bright and forward tone mixing beautifully with Nanna’s more round, breathy one. One of my favorite moments was when everyone from the band except the keyboardist all stood around one microphone and sang the song “Mouse Parade” from their new album. It was a quiet, slightly haunting moment that I really enjoyed.

Of Monsters and Men’s new album “All is Love and Pain in the Mouse Parade” is out now.