People began slowly trickling in at the Music Box at the Fonda Theater in Hollywood June 4. This was just the beginning of the most memorable Friday night show that I’ve ever gone to. The crowd was extremely eclectic with people of all ages ranging from the teenage girls with their chaperone to the bearded indie wool cap-wearing guys and their stringy haired moccasin-wearing girlfriends. And I wonder if Mumford and Sons knew that they had a fan in Jake Gylenhall as he sat looking on from the front row of the balcony.
The Middle East, an Australian collective from Townsville, Queensland, have opened for Mumford and Sons on this tour. There are seven members in the band with one token woman who played everything from tambourine to flute and keyboard. The two main singers each had significantly distinct sounds that balance each other well and brilliant harmony from several members of the band. They all ran around switching up instruments between songs, which made it seemed as if there were more than seven members in the band. A banjo, percussion instruments, multiple guitars, bells on a stick, keyboard, flute, mandolin…I think they covered it all. Each song felt like a slow burning house on fire and before you know it you are engulfed in flames that are inextinguishable. A tingle set out through my body from the tip of my head through my spine and all the way down to my toes that grew with each song. The song that stuck with me the most was called “Blood” and can be downloaded for free by signing up to their mailing list on the website: www.themiddleeastmusic.com.
They were deliberately selected said Ben Lovett who plays keyboard and accordion for Mumford and Sons. “After touring with Middle East through Australia in January we became quite close and it just made sense to have them open for us,” said Lovett. He was barefoot in a white tank top and dark gray trousers, lingering in the backstage area when I caught him for a few questions.
The curtain went down and about 40 minutes passed before the four handsome young Englishmen humbly entered the stage to thundering applause layered over non-stop cheering. They opened with the song “Sigh no more” and it seemed as if the entire audience sang along. They presented an inimitable sound of four-part harmony and a resonance that rumbled from the lowest depths of your belly straight up to your soul. Marcus Mumford sang with a slanted mouth at times to get to just the right tone in his extremely unusual and anomalous voice. There is an incredible sincerity poured out of the lyrics that are poetic, fulfilling, and prophetic at times. The crowd was screaming and rumbling the floor with stomping feet. The members of the band showed a sweet and silly sense of humor by telling stories about one another through shared banter in the breaks. Wonderfully coupled with a properly British politeness displayed by the meek acceptance of wild adoration from the crowd. Ted Dwane alternated between the stand up bass and the electric bass throughout the night. "Country" Winston Marshall played slide guitar and electric guitar, but there was particular rapture in the way he handled the banjo. As if he were channeling a force much greater than himself during the show. Ben Lovett played the keyboard with incredible passion and even hopped on the accordion for a couple songs. Every song, with the exception of the new ones, gained intensity with the harmony of the entire crowd singing along. Many people shouted out “I love you” to the band and requested select songs during quiet moments between songs.
The spirit of the four men and their fervor for life filled the Music Box creating a boundless energy in the room. “Tonight’s show was significantly better than last nights show,” said Lovett. All four in the band are songwriters making them unique and powerful when it comes to the creation and structure of their songs. “We’ve known each other for 16 years and we have a lot of respect for what everyone brings to the table,” said Lovett “we need each other massively.” At the moment they have 15 new songs in early stages that will be on a future album. Mumford and Sons plan to come back to Los Angeles in October to play to another hopefully sold out crowd. If you didn’t get a chance to catch them this time in Los Angeles, I would recommend you get your tickets early to the next show…it’s worth every penny!
