The things that everyone can understand and appreciate, when considering other people - strangers or friends, are shortcomings. It's in them where we're able to see each other as more alike than we are different. It's in our shared shortcomings - because when we face them, they're almost all identical - that we're able to show ourselves as the most human, the most empathetic, the most noble and the most compassionate people we'll ever be. It's when someone loses a loved one to some heartbreaking disease, or simply to the arms of another - when things have not turned out right, for one reason or another, that we lower our voices, loosen our heartstrings and put an arm around a fellow aching body.
These are the people we are when we listen to Mumford & Sons songs. These are the people who write those songs - Marcus Mumford, Ben Lovett, Winston Marshall and Ted Dwane. They are the framers of a compassion that encourages other wounded and wandering souls not to give up on love, but to be wary of it as well - to learn from it. They encourage others to stand tall and to pick themselves up from the ground, dust all of the shit from themselves to get to that upright and venting/marveling at the brightness of a night's moon again. They are a troop of never-say-die-ers, willing to go back into the trenches with the hands and the fire they were born with, along with the people that they know they will always love.
The folks that these men sing about present their burdens and their woes and they then raise a glass to overcoming them all, in heroic fashion. They are determined to not lead dim lives. They are determined to stir up as much energy and life, happiness and occasional sadness, all in the name of the richness and sweet complexity of existence that they've always felt they should have if they were only to get one thing. Mumford, the head of the hopeless wanderers guild, sings on "Not With Haste," "Do not let my fickle flesh go to waste/As it keeps my heart and soul in its place/And I will love with urgency/But not with haste." With those words, Mumford & Sons have cast themselves as men of distinction - those who will burn all nights completely, who will always kiss with their eyes close when they decide to kiss and who will lose many fights, but will never lose the battle.
It's this spirit that the lads from London brought to their Gentlemen of the Road Stopover show in Dixon, Illinois, just over one month ago, inhabiting three campgrounds, a high school, a river and entire sleepy city to put their values on display. It was quite the showing, on a picturesque day and night, under a spectacular sky. It was a show that was epic for its continual moments of brilliance - the kind of moments that can't be taken for granted and everyone there was aware of that. These songs were recorded in high school auditorium, inside a castle-like building, that was ringed with a stone carving of a dog chasing a rat, along with busts of Mark Twain and Abraham Lincoln and they were recorded in the lounge of the band's idling tour bus, both pre and post show. The songs selected - one from the band's new album "Babel" and a collection of traditionals and covers by The Stanley Brothers, Bruce Springsteen, Guy Clark, Roger Miller, Bob Dylan and others go even further in showing the thrust, the focus and the importance of one of the world's great young bands.
Track listing and players:
First song
Not With Haste - recorded in the Dixon High School Auditorium; Players - Marcus Mumford, Ben Lovett, Winston Marshall and Ted Dwane.
Second song
Little Birdie - recorded on the Mumford & Sons tour bus pre-Gentlemen of the Road set; Players - Marcus Mumford, Ben Lovett, Ross Holmes, Abigail Washburn and Nathaniel Rateliff
Third song
Angel Band - recorded on the Mumford & Sons tour bus pre-Gentlemen of the Road set; Players -- Marcus Mumford, Ben Lovett, Ross Holmes, Abigail Washburn and Nathaniel Rateliff
Fourth song
Not In Nottingham - recorded on the Mumford & Sons tour bus post-Gentlemen of the Road set; Players - Marcus Mumford and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes.
Fifth song
Reincarnation -- recorded on the Mumford & Sons tour bus post-Gentlemen of the Road set; Players - Marcus Mumford and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes.
Sixth song
I Was Young When I Left Home -- recorded on the Mumford & Sons tour bus post-Gentlemen of the Road set; Players - Marcus Mumford and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes.
Seventh song
Partner Nobody Chose -- recorded on the Mumford & Sons tour bus post-Gentlemen of the Road set; Players - Marcus Mumford and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes.
Eighth song
Atlantic City -- recorded on the Mumford & Sons tour bus post-Gentlemen of the Road set; Players - Marcus Mumford and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes.