New Mumford & Sons album riffs on deep emotions, divine texts
The mandolin and banjo steadily strum, each string offering a different, perfectly-harmonized sound — some bright and pithy, others much more purposeful — as the deep hum of the upright bass vibrates in the background.
Lyrics fall into the deepest of sorrows and desperately search for answers in the most optimistic of tones. It’s a sort of grace theology tying the collection of heartache, unmet expectations and overrun feelings into an uplifting and very fitting package.
Mumford & Sons, the London-founded band led by Mr. Marcus Mumford, released their sophomore album “Babel” Tuesday, which has now earned the group its first number one in the UK and is said to still become the fastest-selling album of the year.
The album — 12 tracks in its release version, with a 15-track deluxe edition — is brilliant in its conception and gorgeous in its process. It pieces together a divine message of struggle, hope and sacrifice in a religious text, but still candidly leaves the band, the music and its message to pitfalls and flaws.
It starts with the title: “Babel.”
It’s a biblical reference, a story told in the Book of Genesis, that begins with the goal to build a tower to Heaven, and ends with a confounded people — unable to communicate and thus unable to complete the great Tower of Babel.
Mumford is from a religious background. His parents, John and Eleanor, are leaders of the Vineyard Church of the U.K., which was born in California (as was Mumford) and has migrated across the pond. But for those who’d never seen past “Sigh No More” (2010) and the band’s known singles, the religious undertones are unexpected.
The cover shot is the band, dressed with popped collars, laced-up boots and tucked-away neckties. They’re poised and ruffled, with goofy grins and awkward judgmental stares at crossed legs, while the world behind them is blurred in motion. They’ve slowed down their snapshot of time, composed in the madness.
Mumford & Sons went from strangers to success to folk-charged indie rockers quickly. “Little Lion Man,” the band’s first ever single, was blunt and shocking — it introduced the world to the defining percussion and Mumford’s winning accent with one golden chorus: “I really f---ed it up this time / Didn’t I, my dear?”
When Mumford announced the details of “Babel” and released the latest album’s first single, “I Will Wait,” it sounded as if the guys were up to the same tricks, with some added polish and a refined take on the “Little Lion Man.”
“I Will Wait” capitalizes on the four-piece band’s tried and trusted sound with a chorus that plays to the rush of sentimental heart songs à la Jason Mraz, John Mayer and the likes. The video (nearing 4 million views on VEVO) opens to the band on Colorado’s Red Rocks Amphitheatre stage, a jumping crowd singing with the proper gentleman themselves — buttoned in rolled-sleeved, Oxfords and standing tall with each of their respective instruments.
It’s a performance that completely defines the Mumford & Sons we’ve known — charming and grounded, with their hint of grit and slipped-in profanities keeping them real. But the full “Babel” experience is so much more.
The opening and title track pulls back on the Genesis tale of the great tower in its literal cry. Mumford sings: “Like the city that nurtured my greed and my pride / I stretch my arms into the sky.” He goes on with: “All we see will slip into the cloud” and “I should’ve known I was weaker from the start,” creating the complete religious tale of a forever struggle with humility.
“Babel” starts the album strong, in its delivery and actual being, but the track listing runs through the songs in an up and down — from slow, poignant ballads to the angrier throws. “Ghosts That We Knew” is dreary. It’s stripped down and ripped open. Mumford begins with solo plucks at his guitar — the twang ringing after the note, as is signature — and continues through the song with a reserved and rather ominous course.
Track six, “Lover of the Light,” is one of my two personal favorites in the deluxe edition’s 15. The words dance around the same religious undertones, but sing sweetly in an admission to foolish pride and a vow to change: “So love the one you hold / And I’ll be your gold / To have and to hold.” And, Mumford misses his “sanguine eyes.” Props have to be given to fitting sanguine into a song.
“Lover’s Eyes” is another lovesick track, which continues to play with religious guilt. It’s a tricky line to navigate, and Mumford has achieved it in the album’s sound — it skates over the heavy issues and the insurmountable struggles with a higher power, standing alone in its musical truth and inspiration. The religion really filters through when you sit down with the lyrics, that are painted with a Christian faith.
Then comes seething anger. In “Broken Crown” the verses are dark and the tone is heavy: “I took the road and I f---ed it all away / Now in this twilight how dare you speak of grace.” It closes simply with, “In this twilight our choices seal our fate.”
The three bonus tracks hide a little Mumford treasure. The deluxe edition is crucial.
If “The Boxer,” featuring Jerry Douglas and Paul Simon, isn’t enough in its accompaniment, the final “Babel” showing, “Where Are You Now,” seals the album’s fate.
It’s a breakup song and it holds the same kind of appeal as Adele’s “Someone Like You.” Mumford grapples with an unfulfilled love, and a stinging question: “Do you ever think of me in the quiet, in the crowd?”
The album is beautiful in the story it tells and it holds a different message for each fan. There are those that will flock to its take on religion, and there are others that will take the stray direct plea to God with a grain of salt, just another part of the creative process.