Mumford & Sons’ Babel takes home Grammy for Album of the Year

Babel Mumford & Sons

Released: September 21, 2012 Charted: September 30, 2012 Peak: 15 US, 13 UK, 16 CN, 2 AU Sales (in millions): 2.7 US, 1,06 UK, 5.67 world (includes US and UK) Genre: folk rock

Tracks: Song Title (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to singles charts. Babel (10/13/12, 60 US, 13 AA, 19 MR, 76 UK) Whispers in the Dark (10/13/12, 81 US) I Will Wait (8/7/12, 12 US, 14 RR, 11 AC, 1 A40, 1 AA, 37a CW, 1 MR, 12 UK, 9 CN, 23 AU) Holland Road (10/13/12, 84 US) Ghosts That We Knew (10/13/12, 88 US) Lover of the Light (10/20/12, 97 US, 36 A40, 1 AA, 4 MR, 94 CN) Lovers’ Eyes (10/13/12, 85 US) Reminder Hopeless Wanderer (11/24/12, 59 US) Broken Crown Below My Feet Not with Haste Total Running Time: 52:17 The Players: Marcus Mumford (vocals, guitar, drums) Ted Dwane (bass, backing vocals) Ben Lovett (keyboards, backing vocals) Winston Marshall (banjo, guitar, dobro, backing vocals)

Rating: 3.524 out of 5.00 (average of 36 ratings) Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album: “English folk revivalists Mumford & Sons’ 2009 debut, Sigh No More, boarded the slowest train it could find on its journey from regional gem to pleasantly surprising, international success story.” AMG The band Rolling Stone called “the biggest little string band on the planet” WK recalled days when “the Carter Family and the Louvin Brothers were radio gold” RS by crafting crafted “a set of rousing tunes clad in choirboy harmonies, clawhammer banjo and Salvation Army brass that exploded amid a sea of AutoTuned cyber-pop.” RS Perhaps even more surprising than the success of their debut, however, was how much their sophomore effort was embraced. With 600,000 copes moved in its first week out, the album was second only to Taylor Swift’s Red for biggest debut of the year. WK The album did much to cement the growing folk-rock revival which has now included success for back-to-their-roots acts like The Lumineers, The Avett Brothers, and Alabama Shakes. The launch of the movement could arguably be tied to the Album of the Year Grammy win for Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs. Interestingly, Markus Dravs produced that album and he also lends his talents here – and the result is another Grammy for Album of the Year (as well as a nomination for the UK equilvalent, the Brit Award for Album of the Year). “Short of being a little rowdier and raspier, Babel feels less like a legitimate sequel and more like an expanded edition” AMG of Sigh No More. This album “steps up Mumford & Sons’ game without changing it too much. It feels shinier, punchier, more arena-scale than the debut, with the band hollering, hooting, plucking and strumming like Olympian street buskers.” RS The band admitted they deliberately tried to hone the sound they’d already developed instead of altering it. WK These are songs which are “ballsy, pained, fiery, and fraught with near constant references to sin, salvation, and all of the pontifical hopes and doubts that lie between.” AMG “Most of Babel is caught between the confessional and an apocalyptic hootenanny, delivering its everyman message with the kind of calculated spiritual fervor that comes from having to adapt to the festival masses as opposed to the smaller club crowds.” AMG The downfall is that while this is “another set of incredibly spirited songs” AMG they sometimes “bark much louder than they bite.” AMG As the Chicago Tribune’s Greg Kot wrote, “There’s nothing wrong with a rousing sing-along among 25,000 of your closest friends. The real issue with Mumford & Sons is its pedestrian songwriting and predictable delivery.” WK Kot also said, “The band pays lip service to the idea of keeping things earthy and organic, and therefore somehow more sincere or heartfelt…but they wash out the gritty details.” WK “Tracks like Hopeless Wanderer, Broken Crown, and the vivacious title cut bristle with moxie and self-importance, but feel like a ruse” AMG as they rely on a “kind of generic, turgid melodrama that always overshoots its mark.” AMG This is an album “full of all manner of religious shoptalk, with Biblical metaphors swirling.” RS Still, “proselytizing is not the mission on Babel; instead the band uses spirituality “to supersize and complicate love songs. Lovers’ Eyes is merely the best of several songs that wrestle with betrayer’s guilt.” RS Elsewhere songs like the “hymnlike first single, I Will Wait and Lover of the Light both are proof that the Mumfords do dramatic builds, dropouts and soft-loud shifts as impressively as U2.” RS

Resources and Related Links: DMDB encyclopedia entry for Mumford & Sons AMG All Music Guide review by James Christopher Monger RS Rolling Stone review by Will Hermes WK Wikipedia First posted 2/12/2013; last updated 5/2/2022.

Mumford & Sons released Sigh No More

Sigh No More Mumford & Sons

Released: October 2, 2009 Peak: 2 US, 2 UK, 2 CN, 13 AU Sales (in millions): 3.2 US, 1.61 UK, 7.61 world (includes US and UK) Genre: folk rock

Tracks: Song Title (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to singles charts. Sigh No More The Cave (2/26/10, 27 US, 40 A40, 2 AA, 3 MR, 31 UK, 31 CN, 32 AU) Winter Winds (12/6/09, 44 UK) Roll Away Your Stone (6/3/10, 5 AA, 10 MR) White Blank Page I Gave You All Little Lion Man (8/11/09, 45 US, 10 A40, 2 AA, 1 MR, 24 UK, 59 CN, 3 AU) Timshel Thistle & Weeds Awake My Soul Dust Bowl Dance After the Storm Total Running Time: 48:33 The Players: Marcus Mumford (vocals, guitar, drums) Ted Dwane (bass, backing vocals) Ben Lovett (keyboards, backing vocals) Winston Marshall (banjo, guitar, dobro, backing vocals)

Rating: 3.638 out of 5.00 (average of 21 ratings) Quotable: “An impressive debut, but one that impresses more for its promise of the future.” – James Christopher Monger, All Music Guide Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album: Interestingly enough, this album which fits so snugly into the 21st century Americana movement in the U.S. is actually an indie folk rock group from West London. Both the U.S. and the U.K. warmly embraced the album; Mumford & Sons earned a Grammy nomination for Best New Artist and another nod for Best Rock Song with “Little Lion Man.” Across the ocean, the album was also a nominee for the Mercury Prize in 2010 and it took home the prize for Best British Album at the 2011 Brit Awards. “Formed in 2007, that band’s goal since day one has been to make music that matters. Before recording their debut, Mumford & Sons self produced three EP’s and toured the UK extensively, bringing their rootsy rock across the country.” AZ “Like their London underground folk scene contemporaries Noah & the Whale, Johnny Flynn, and Laura Marling, Mumford & Sons’ take on British folk is far from traditional.” AMG The group has “a gutsy, old-time sound that marries the magic of Crosby, Stills & Nash with the might of Kings of Leon and the harmonies of Fleet Foxes.” AZ They also owe “more than a cursory nod to bands like the Waterboys, the Pogues, and the Men They Couldn’t Hang.” AMG “The group’s heady blend of biblical imagery, pastoral introspection, and raucous, pub-soaked heartache may be earnest to a fault, but when the wildly imperfect Sigh No More is firing on all cylinders, as is the case with stand-out cuts like The Cave, Winter Winds, and Little Lion Man, it’s hard not to get swept up in the rapture.” AMG Time Out NY has said, “The Brit combo has a spine-tingling way to harmony.” AZ “The band teamed with producer Markus Dravs who has worked with such superstar acts as Arcade Fire, Bjork and Peter Gabriel.” AZ He “helps to keep the record from completely sinking into the quicksand of its myriad slow numbers – tracks like I Gave You All, Thistle & Weeds, and After the Storm are pretty and plain enough, but they neuter a band this spirited.” AMG Sigh No More is an impressive debut, but one that impresses more for its promise of the future than it does its wildly inconsistent place in the present.” AMG

Resources and Related Links: DMDB encyclopedia entry for Mumford & Sons AMG All Music Guide review by James Christopher Monger AZ Amazon.com WK Wikipedia First posted 2/15/2011; last updated 5/2/2022.