Beautiful Rat Sunset

206. Going to Maryland

Alex Russell Beautiful Rat Sunset , , , , , , ,

One character explores craps betting as a stand-in for the difficulties of a relationship in “Going to Maryland.”

Track: “Going to Maryland”
Album: Beautiful Rat Sunset (1994)

There are hundreds of different locations across Mountain Goats songs. The geographic mentions often ground otherwise general songs in the specific, allowing the listener to imagine themselves in the open English countryside or the mysterious political workings of an ancient civilization. How you read the location changes based on who, and where, you are. If you’re from Maryland, what does it mean to be “Going to Maryland?”

Locals apparently generally add the article “the” to Chesapeake Bay. John Darnielle isn’t from Maryland, which explains the absence of “the” in the line “and your eyes shine tonight on Chesapeake Bay.” I’m not local either and have never noticed it before, but it’s interesting what even small shifts in language tell us. Everyone’s home has those nuances, like how the contraction “ya’ll” rather than “y’all” serves as a sign that someone may not be used to using it or whether you use pop or soda to refer to a fizzy drink may identify where you were born.

This obviously isn’t central to the understanding of the song, but it serves as a springboard to talk about a live performance of “Going to Maryland” at the legendary CBGB in New York. John Darnielle changes the line that follows “five dollars says that it’s gone in a minute” from “five dollars says that your heart goes with it” to “five dollars more says my chances went with it.” The original version is slow and the gambling references through the lyrics feel sorrowful, but the live version drives much quicker and feels desperate. The shift is small, but it changes how you feel about the speaker. Are these people in love or this a different kind of relationship?

205. Song for Mark and Joel

Alex Russell Beautiful Rat Sunset , , , , , ,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAVklJApwWw

“Song for Mark and Joel” is for Mark and Joel, but it’s also for that creeping dread you try to avoid.

Track: “Song for Mark and Joel”
Album: Beautiful Rat Sunset (1994)

The Mark and Joel of “Song for Mark and Joel” are Mark Givens and Joel Huschle of Wckr Spgt, a band that’s closely associated with the Mountain Goats. John Darnielle gets a specific mention on the “other artists” page of their website. It says that John Darnielle and Peter Hughes are “really doing wonders in the world of rock and roll,” which you may assume I agree with based on the whole point of this thing.

I haven’t listened to much Wckr Spgt, but it’s easy to see how John Darnielle fell in love. One of their recent albums includes a song called “Skin, the First Line of Defense.” That really says it all.

When John Darnielle plays “Song for Mark and Joel” he often says some variant of “this is a song I wrote for Mark and Joel and it is called ‘Song for Mark and Joel.'” It’s a dry comment, but it says a lot about the man that wrote a song for two friends in 1994 and may not have imagined he’d be playing it for hundreds of people night after night twenty-five years later.

The opening lyrics describe a natural setting. It’s pure early Mountain Goats: a bird (not a robin, but close) sits on a branch and a narrator feels a vaguely troubling sensation. By the second verse our narrator is in a room full of maps. Quickly, they tell us about a sense of cold and begin “pondering connections.” John Darnielle doesn’t give us enough to decipher what’s happening, but it ends up being a powerful sensation all the same. We’ve all felt that menace in the air and by leaving it general, it works for whatever causes that feeling in your bones.

204. New Star Song

Alex Russell Beautiful Rat Sunset , , , , , ,

During a train delay in Redding, Washington, the narrator in “New Star Song” takes in local culture.

Track: “New Star Song”
Album: Beautiful Rat Sunset (1994)

If you have thirty-five hours, you can get from Los Angeles to Seattle on the Coast Starlight passenger train. If you do this, you’ll make 28 stops and spend some time in Redding, California. You’ll wait in the same place that John Darnielle waited decades ago on a similar trip for a likely much different purpose.

It’s uncharacteristic that John Darnielle offered up as much as he did about “New Star Song,” but in 1998 he mentioned that it’s slightly autobiographical. “Slightly” is doing a lot of work there, but he did wait in Redding and watch four movies, seemingly waiting for his evening train. The similarities between the narrator and songwriter end there, but it’s telling that Beautiful Rat Sunset imagines a character waiting there through lightning storms, thinking about “things that I thought that I’d soon be forgetting.”

The strumming on “New Star Song” is angry, even for an early 90s Mountain Goats song. It opens with a clang and doubles down with a handful of furious beats over John Darnielle’s wailing “I thought about how cold you must be!” It lends itself to live performance, as many of the angry-without-being-violent ones do from this era, and as such has been played dozens of times over the years. Most versions stay true to the original and focus on the chorus and the delivery of those lines about someone else, far away, and how they must feel. Our narrator is in a hot, hostile place and they’re hanging pictures of someone everywhere. Typically that’s a sign that someone is lost, but it seems just as likely that this is a grand gesture that’s part of an ill-fated trip.

203. Itzcuintli-Totzli Days

Alex Russell Beautiful Rat Sunset , , , , , ,

“Itzuintli-Totzli Days” spends a sing-song (possibly) happy moment with a rabbit and a dear friend.

Track: “Itzcuintli-Totzli Days”
Album: Beautiful Rat Sunset (1994)

The Mountain Goats played “Itzcuintli-Totzli Days” at least twice in 1997. At one show, John Darnielle asked the audience to sing along with him in the spirit of the song’s intention. At the other show, John Darnielle opened the show with it and called it an “old song.”

People tape Mountain Goats shows and put them up online just like they do for so many other bands. This allows us to follow a partial history which we know is incomplete. There may be dozens of other recordings or unrecorded instances of “Itzcuintli-Totzli Days” out there, but those two sum it up perfectly. It’s a happy, bouncing song that even unfamiliar fans can sing along with by the end. “Let the big, big rabbit come out,” John Darnielle demands, and the crowd sings along.

The title comes from terms the Aztecs used for “dog” and “rabbit,” which represented specific elements of their calendar. The dog stood for death and the memory of the dead, while the rabbit stood for brighter moments of fertility and spirituality. The Mountain Goats dance between those two emotions frequently, but it’s rare that they do so gleefully. The day gets dark towards the end of “Itzcuintli-Totzli Days,” but the narrator is still thrilled to spend this time with someone. It’s more uplifting than we’ve come to expect, especially on an album that ends with the chilling “Resonant Bell World.” Your best bet is to sing along and beat back the darkness with a smile as you stave off the coming bad times, especially while you’ve got someone to hold your hand.

202. Song for Cleomenes

Alex Russell Beautiful Rat Sunset , , , , , ,

John Darnielle goes deep into history to tell the story of a very specific, very evil trick in “Song for Cleomenes.”

Track: “Song for Cleomenes”
Album: Beautiful Rat Sunset (1994)

In San Francisco in 2001, John Darnielle played his cover of “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry.” He ended the song and the crowd shouted requests from all across the catalog. Darnielle told the crowd to keep the requests coming, as he wasn’t confident about any of the remaining songs on his set list.

He played nine more songs, most of them safe picks that you might still hear at a show today. He started that list, however, with the ultra rare “Song for Cleomenes.” I can’t find any other recordings of it, though it seems he’s played it other times. This rendition is only vaguely like the studio version on Beautiful Rat Sunset, but that doesn’t matter. It’s the same driving, terrifying guitar, punctuated by screams as the crowd learns the story of Gaius Verres.

The song tells you all you need to know: Gaius Verres was a horrible criminal who abused his civic power for his own gain. Cicero destroyed him in court and he had to leave town, largely on the testimony of the boat-burning trickery in the song.

People seem to delight in finding inaccuracies in the historical songs, but that seems to miss the point. The live version is slightly clearer than the studio version about what happens in the end and editorializes more about Cicero’s prose, but the differences don’t matter. It’s about the joy John Darnielle clearly finds in telling a story that most people won’t know, but ultimately relating it. Two characters, you and the narrator, end up on a beach watching boats on fire. It’s surprising to find yourself in the song, and it makes you wonder what you were doing in 73 BC.

137. Resonant Bell World

Alex Russell Beautiful Rat Sunset , , , , , , ,

 

A narrator confronts someone about their animal tendencies in “Resonant Bell World.”

Track: “Resonant Bell World”
Album: Beautiful Rat Sunset (1994)

The liner notes for Beautiful Rat Sunset contain a story about Agamemnon, multiple odes to coffee, and a surprisingly straightforward description of the cover. The songs weave through the days of the Aztecs, ancient Italy, modern Peru, and Maryland. It’s tough to pin down a connection, despite a vague sense of discomfort around location that characters seem to keep experiencing. The whole thing closes with “Resonant Bell World,” which doesn’t mention location at all.

The narrator in “Resonant Bell World” describes the animals someone else embodies. They call them a starling, which is a gentle creature, but then a kite (presumably the bird of prey and not the toy) and a hyena. “You’re a stray dog at night” could mean many things, but it’s assuredly negative.

The animal comparisons make up most of the song, but John Darnielle closes with multiple repetitions of “in the starlight.” It’s hypnotic and might not mean anything. It does allow for time to imagine this scene. The narrator is frustrated, or angry, or sad, or disappointed, and in a song like this there’s enough room for them to be all four. Some Mountain Goats songs are so short that you have to fill in the gaps in story yourself. “Resonant Bell World” suggests a narrator with narrowed eyes and a slight buzz. They’re tired of someone else and they want to finally say what’s on their mind. Your vision may be slightly different, but the “you made your special lunge for my throat // and between you and me // it was really exciting” verse will shift accordingly. Maybe that’s funny to you and maybe it’s dire. John Darnielle stops playing as he sings it, which is rare, and you will be forced to feel whatever emotion you connect with the narrator in that moment.

089. Sendero Luminoso Verdadero

Alex Russell Beautiful Rat Sunset , , , , , ,

 

After a perfect intro, “Sendero Luminoso Verdadero” tells the story of a displaced person and the associated emotions.

Track: “Sendero Luminoso Verdadero”
Album: Beautiful Rat Sunset (1994)

“Sendero Luminoso” translates to “Shining Path,” which is the name of a radical organization that seeks to transform Peru into the “true democracy” of Communism by seeking the “shining path.” Verdadero means “true” or “correct,” so the title translates vaguely as “the true shining path.”

The narrator says “I remember Lima // I remember the good life” which you can take to mean the time before the true shining path folks got involved or the revolution itself, depending on your interpretation of the narrator. The group is designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, and while not every narrator in a Mountain Goats song is a good person it’s a safe bet that this one isn’t a Peruvian radical. But then again, given the gallery of rogues John Darnielle writes about, they very well could be.

Whichever way you take the narrator, the song is fascinating. It opens with a bit of a recording that asks the listener to “invade his space by standing a little closer than normal” as a means of dealing with an older man afraid of his fading virility. It’s powerfully evocative and it’s one of the best odd clips in the catalog. Lots of songs use odd sounds or out-of-place recordings to set the mood, but “Sendero Luminoso Verdadero” revisits it at the end with fading ocean sounds after the narrator reflects on their situation in California. Whether this is a frustrated, displaced person or a dormant revolutionary is up to you, but the song is unique and beautiful either way. The strumming is fierce and John Darnielle sneers the verses with a longing that translates whichever way you way it to affect you.

082. Seeing Daylight

Alex Russell Beautiful Rat Sunset , , , , , , ,

“Seeing Daylight” seems simple at first, but the importance of one phone call when you need it shines through.

Track: “Seeing Daylight”
Album: Beautiful Rat Sunset (1994)

Some of the songs evolve. In 1994 on Beautiful Rat Sunset, “Seeing Daylight” sounds like a song from a troubled narrator. John Darnielle’s voice trembles as he sings the simple chorus of “boil, boil.” He lilts as he talks about the strange niceness of hearing a voice on the other end of a phone. He’s contemplative, but clearly very sad about his day and his space in the world. It’s understandable, even though we don’t get any details about this narrator.

By 2011, the song changes. On this live recording in New York, John is even quieter when he speak-sings the sad, mundane lyrics. The narrator is still troubled, but it’s now a more specific, less hopeful kind of troubled. He vibrates over “the impossible echo inside” and it makes you consider what that means, both to the narrator and in general. There are a dozen lyrics like that scattered over the catalog. There is no clear meaning to it, but you can get a general sense of the tone it is meant to evoke. The narrator is cooking a very simple meal and they are surprised by how much they are surprised by a phone call. Everyone can remember a day where they felt like they were the only person on earth and were then taught otherwise by a surprising interaction.

The only comment on this song I can find is from that same live show, where John said “this is a song about death.” I take that to mean that the narrator is feeling lost and scared and is only tethered to this world by one interaction. This is not unfamiliar territory for the Goats, but this song’s mundane nature requires deeper digging to find your own meaning in it.