We were exhausted by late afternoon at Newport Folk Festival, that kind of festival fatigue where you’ve been on your feet all day and the summer sun has soaked into your bones. Mt. Joy came on, the stage facing the harbor with the crowd stretched out in between. I’d been listening to them for years; knew the fan favorite lines, the popular guitar riffs that get stuck in your head for days. But nothing prepared me for the live show. Two minutes into their first song, they filled us with energy and exuberance, the crowd swaying like wheat in the breeze, the sound washing over us warm and immediate. I turned to Alisha Patterson, my co-producer and co-director, and said, “We have to do this film about these guys.”
That’s how the best projects start, with a gut feeling that won’t let go.
We’d already been in touch with their management about the possibility of a short doc, but nothing was finalized. After Newport, it became a must. A few months later, our DP Aaron Pittman and we were driving from Atlanta up to Cary, N.C., to make it real. We were shooting the first installment of our new series “On in Five,” short documentaries that capture bands’ offstage lives and personalities, including those electric last five minutes before they take the stage, and we were nervous.
From the moment we arrived, it was clear why their live show had hit me so hard at Newport. The energy that translates on stage isn’t manufactured, it’s just who they are. Sitting down for interviews, the band was immediately warm, welcoming, open in a way that put everyone at ease. They treated us like old friends from the first handshake, cracked jokes between takes, teased each other with genuine affection. There’s a generosity of spirit to Mt. Joy that’s rare in any context, let alone in a band that could easily coast on their success. Instead, they made us feel less like documentary filmmakers and more like people they were genuinely excited to share their story with.
They opened up about something that’s become central to their touring life: giving back. This tour has been packed with nonprofit collaborations, culminating in a massive benefit show at TD Garden. Listening to them discuss the causes they support, you realize the same warmth that fills their music, the same kindness they showed us with our cameras, extends to how they move through the world.
But Mt. Joy isn’t all earnest mission statements and serious conversations. Their preshow ritual is refreshingly, wonderfully silly. As we filmed them in those final thirty minutes before showtime, there was laughter, loose shoulders, an absence of pretense.
When they finally took the stage that night in Cary, we captured the show from every angle we could find. That feeling I had at Newport Folk Festival? It came rushing back, but this time we had it on film. “On in Five” launches with Mt. Joy showing us that the best moments happen when the cameras are rolling and the music is about to begin.
