“The Bad Doctor” is not about that doctor, but it’s about a doctor, and it’ll force you to sit up and take notice.

Track: “The Bad Doctor”
Album: Songs for Petronius (1992) and Bitter Melon Farm (1999)

If you played “The Bad Doctor” for ten random people you would probably have ten confused people, but if you insisted they listen to it a few times and explain what they thought it was about, they would probably say “Jack Kevorkian.” When you say a phrase like “death-dealing physician” you run into a kind of “facial tissues” vs. “Kleenex” problem. There is only one of this thing, so people call it that thing.

John Darnielle has said a few times that it’s not about that, but it reminds me of the discussion about “Down to the Ark” which talks about political posters that are Obama’s colors during the Obama years but is not about Obama. If John Darnielle says you’re wrong you are wrong, but it’s really easy to see how people came to the conclusion they did. He specifically said “The Bad Doctor” is “about a malevolent force that runs around dispensing death in the guise of medicine — actual widespread death, not the merciful death of Jack Kevorkian.” That’s more than you’ll usually get, which he seems to have only said because he had to be insistent that it is not about what you think.

It’s a very long song, for the time, and it’s a pretty vivid story. The chorus of increasingly insistent “oh yeah” repetition further makes this a strange one, though I always remember how an old friend of mine really, really loved this one. It’s these kinds of songs that worm into your brain and why older Mountain Goats songs are so special. It’s about a magic doctor that murders people, but if that’s not enough, it’s catchy, too.