“Ditmas” by Mumford and the Sons

"Ditmas" is the sound of Mumford & Sons putting the banjo mostly away and plugging in. The third single from Wilder Mind, their third album, it went out worldwide on September 11, 2015, and it takes its name from Ditmas Park in Brooklyn, home to the studio of The National's Aaron Dessner, where most of the record was written and demoed.

It's a breakup song, and it wears the band's change of direction on its sleeve: less banjo, more electric instruments, a bigger and rangier sound. Alex Southam directed the video in Kyiv, the story of a Ukrainian Cossack and his horse, cut with shots of the band playing the song. American alternative stations got it that November.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.