Mumford & Sons (2019)

One Liner: Roots rocking Americana revivalists with two great albums and then ...

Wikipedia Genre: Folk rock, alternative rock
Home: London

Poster Position: 1

Both Weekends.

Thoughts:  I'm honestly shocked that they were named to the top of the ACL bill yet again.  Not that a three year gap is too short for ACL to permit the turnaround, but I feel like those bands who make the quick turnaround to come back to play again are usually ones whose star has shot up or their stature has changed in a major way.  Like Chance the Rapper coming back several times, with only year gaps, as he went from mixtape rapper to megastar.  But these dudes just headlined in 2016, and while they have released a new album since then, it wasn't a game-changer.

Instead, 2018's Delta was released with a whimper, with a 5.8 (of 10) from Pitchfork ("Modern rock isn’t dead—it’s just weightless."), a 2 star (of 5) from Rolling Stone ("Experimental new album takes the band’s sound to gloomy extremes."), a bad review from SPIN ("The result is an hour-long slog with only a few brief realizations of their old potential before the next crescendo hits."), and an overall 59% on Metacritic.  My review of it was as I remember this album, uneven - with a few good songs, and then a handful of actively bad tracks.

So because of that, it seems like an odd time to bring them right on back out as a top headliner.  Everyone who comes to the show is going to just want to hear the classics from Babel and Sigh No More.  No one is coming to that show hoping that they go for deep cuts off of Delta.  So, pretty much the same show as three years ago, right?

I'll give you two songs from the new album, and then I'm just going to cut and paste the whole review from the last time they were headed to the Fest.  First, their most popular is "Guiding Light," and I'll fully admit that its a solid tune.

44.8 million streams and a feel good video.  What's not to like?  A driving, insistent feel to the song and a joyous chorus, it feels like the old Mumford back for another run.  Actually, I asked a question, and my answer is the lyrics - the lyrics to this song are super generic platitudes.  "I had it all on the line" and "you'll always be my only guiding light" and whatnot, there is nothing original or interesting in those words at all.  Now I'll give you a weird video that puts together two of the songs I really hate, along with some cool imagery.  This is "Picture You" and "Darkness Visible."

I mean, what is that electro-snap BS?  "Darkness Visible" has the fewest streams of anything on the album, as just over 6 million, so I'm not alone in being disappointed by this stuff.

Actually, before I get to the old review, let's look at their current setlists on this tour, to see what we might be able to expect from this show.  Their most recent show featured seven songs from Delta (ugh), five songs from Wilder Mind (double mega-uggh), four songs from Sigh No More, three songs from Babel, and three covers ("Walking on Sunshine," NIN's "Hurt," and "You Shook Me All Night Long," which are actually pretty fun covers for them to tackle).  So that kind of sucks.  A good bit more than half of the tunes will be from their two newer albums, and we'll only get the biggest hits from the OG stuff.  Hmmm.  Makes me less likely to go to this show for sure...

Prior review:
One Liner: Rootsy Folk Revivalist Kings! (if you ignore that 2015 album)

Poster Position: 1

Thoughts:  Look, I get it.  That last album (2015's Wilder Mind) was disappointing.  But people need to chill out about the hate.  One album where these guys branch out and try a different sound shouldn't somehow invalidate the two albums of really excellent and kick ass music that they put together before then.  I know someone can likely argue with me about the genesis of the throwback stomping roots folk rock movement, but to me its these guys.  And they did it with no warning, just a guerrilla attack blast of banjo and emotionally-charged power.  When "Little Lion Man" started getting alternative radio play, from 2009's Sigh No More, I think we were all kind of confused about what was going on, and then you found yourself standing on top of your Accord, ripping off your shirt, pumping your fist, and yelling about how you really f'ed it up this time.

That chorus, and then the soaring aaaaaahhhhhaaaaaahhhaaaaaaa! in the middle are just so great.  And they still feel real and unsullied after several years and a load of copy cats. That one clocks in at 124.5 million streams on Spotify (EDIT : up to 251.5 now after three years), which is only good for second (fourth now) place on their list.  I actually would have expected that "The Cave" to be the top track off of that album, but it only fires up 118.8 million listens (253 million in 2019).  The banjo speed on that track is impressive. But that album was massively popular, selling enough to become more than 3x platinum in the U.S. and similarly huge in other countries.

The second album, 2012's Babel, didn't sell as many copies, but won the Grammy for Album of the Year and felt even bigger than the first disc.  They didn't stray from the original formula, sticking to fist-pumping banjo rock and earnest lyrics with great sing-along choruses.  The big hit from this album, and the band's biggest track overall, is "I Will Wait," with over 150.5 million streams (up to a whopping 310.5 million in 2019).

I have a special spot in my heart for that song because when my youngest kiddo was still very small, that was about the only song she knew the lyrics to and it was damn cute when she would repeat along with it in the back seat of the 'burb as we tooled around life.  Anyway, Babel picks up right where Sigh left off and is excellent.  I can get it if you don't like rock or dislike bluegrass or whatever, but it is hard to deny the propulsive joy I feel when I hear these songs.

And then the third album.  Oh, that third album.  As I said in my original review of the album, it isn't actually bad music, its just disappointing because of the legacy created by this band. If this album had been released under a pseudonym, no one would have noticed it because it is generically blah, but people wouldn't have crapped all over it either.  Just another middling soft rock album in a pile of eight billion that have disappeared into history.  But because it was Mumford, and they turned their back on their core sound and style, everybody hated it.  I just read something in Rolling Stone where one of the band members said they could have made Sign No More 2, but then they all would have been depressed. I don't know, man, is it better to be depressed because fans and critics alike hate your new album, or to be depressed because your massively popular third album just won some more Grammys and created world peace?

And since that weak third album, they just recently decided to go even further afield from their original sound and go full on Paul Simon and give their music the Graceland and Rhythm of the Saints treatment.  A short five song EP called Johannesburg came out a few weeks ago, and is actually really enjoyable.  Of course, I am a sucker for Graceland and even facsimiles of Graceland (like Vampire Weekend), so this one hits a sweet spot for me.  The EP was a project with Baaba Maal ("legendary Senegalese singer"), The Very Best ("Swedish-Malawian" "electronic pop collective"), and Beatenberg ("South African pop trio"), hammered out when Mumford & Sons toured down to South Africa and decided to make something with all of these disparate artists. I get that some people may continue to crap on the band here, for a imperialistic appropriation of sounds or sonic tourism or whatever, but if anyone seems earnest and real about just wanting to join up with these people and make music, its these guys.  Screw it, I like these songs.  The album opener is "There Will Be Time."

I see the poor banjo guy picking at his axe during that video, but I can't say that I hear any of the old school banjo-fied soul Mumford, but you definitely get the earnest, soaring sing-along that honestly just gave me goosebumps in watching that video.  The second track, "Wona" sounds just like Vampire Weekend to me.  I couldn't find who sang it in a 3 second google search, but if it isn't Ezra Keonig I'd be surprised.  And then the closer, "Si Tu Veux" is a real beauty.

I've been bummed for years that I missed out on a special show they did in Austin.  They had a show with the Austin High Band, in which I was a player back 20 something years ago.  

Man, I wanted to be part of the drum line something fierce.  And I think this was part of this cool tour they did where they traveled across the country on a train (the Railroad Revival Tour) and played shows with Edward Sharpe and Old Crow Medicine Show from the train. Sounded so cool.  But I missed out on that.  I don't plan to miss out on them at the Festival this fall.  Excited for the show.

[end old review]

Their show in 2016 was actually really great.  They are high energy, their hits are truly fantastic to bop along to in a big crowd, and the crowd was into it.  Depending on their competition for their time slot, I might just remember the glory days on that one this year.