Track Review: Elvis Costello and Mumford & Sons, “The Ghost of Tom Joad”

Whenever an artist brings back an old song, chances are he or she hopes it will still resonate with modern audiences. In the case of Elvis Costello and Mumford & Sons’ ingenious, heartfelt take on Bruce Springsteen’s “The Ghost Of Tom Joad,” the resonance is multiplied many times over because the song’s original inspiration goes way back and, sadly, because the societal ills it catalogs are still prevalent.

The off-the-cuff cover was done to benefit the agit8 campaign to fight poverty. Springsteen’s original from 1995 details the harrowing plight of the homeless. To drive his point home, The Boss quoted from John Steinbeck’s The Grapes Of Wrath, the definitive saga of Dust Bowl migrants, in the final verse.

Costello and the Mumfords add a little bit to the stew with their own mining of antiquated source material. After Marcus Mumford handles the first verse of Springsteen’s song, Costello shifts into a portion of Woody Guthrie’s “Do Re Mi,” a sardonic anthem warning to those weary travelers who expect the good life to be waiting for them in California to think again.

Mumford & Sons dial down the frenzy that they bring to so many of their live performances, and the result is a more nuanced yet still intense reading of the song, with banjo, accordion, and stand-up bass lending the right amount of rootsy ambience. When Elvis and Marcus harmonize in the refrain, it’s a really great moment. In fact, the yearning in their melded voices seems to impart the wish that someday soon “The Ghost Of Tom Joad” will be a dusty relic rather than an accurate depiction of current times.