Chile de Árbol

199. Night of the Mules

Alex Russell Chile de Árbol, Protein Source of the Future...Now! , , , , , , ,

Vague religious references and a group of foreboding animals populate “Night of the Mules.”

Track: “Night of the Mules”
Album: Chile de Árbol (1993) and Protein Source of the Future…Now! (1999)

Chile de Árbol is a strange collection. One song is about the end of the world and the Easter Bunny, another is about Billy the Kid, and the other three are challenging to approach even at a basic level. “Night of the Mules” seems to be about generalized menace, with only the title to suggest where the source of said menace lies.

A few years ago John Darnielle opened a concert with “Night of the Mules.” He’s said recently that he likes to open shows with old or rare songs so few people in the crowd will know the first one. It’s a powerful effect, and it usually quiets the crowd as people try to figure out what they’re listening to or if they’ve heard it before. “Night of the Mules” doesn’t need much updating to fit in with a modern Mountain Goats show. It’s all fierce guitar and sneers, so it’s a perfect wake-the-crowd-up jam to hear up top.

The only commentary I can find is one quote where John Darnielle says the song is about an ending that will come for everyone. Kyle Barbour, author of The Annotated Mountain Goats, suggests that it’s a Biblical song because of the presence of kings, holly, and mistletoe, but he also hears “praying” in the second verse where I hear “braying.” That’s as good of an answer as anything I can come up with, but I’m more comfortable calling this a generalized view of an end times. The religious reading is backed up by the opening sample from Genesis about Abraham’s attempt to save the city of Sodom if ten good men exist there, but mules coming to destroy everything seems more like a John Darnielle original idea to me.

121. Going to Malibu

Alex Russell Chile de Árbol, Protein Source of the Future...Now! , , , , , , ,

The robotic drum beat and delivery on “Going to Malibu” turn an argument into a march to war.

Track: “Going to Malibu”
Album: Chile de Árbol (1993) and Protein Source of the Future…Now! (1999)

Chile de Árbol is not an easy listen two decades after release. The recording is scratchy and caries all of the “poor-quality-on-purpose” charm that the early releases do. Lyrically, it’s challenging and confusing. There are tons of Biblical references, a song about Billy the Kid’s magic shoes, and an extended discussion of the Easter Bunny that might be about the end of the world. We’re deep in the weeds in 1993, but there are treasures there.

“Going to Malibu” is the most “Mountain Goats” song on the album. All five songs have charm, but “Going to Malibu” is a direct address from one character to another about the state of their relationship. The relentless, mechanical rat-a-tat-tat marching drum sells a sense of unavoidable dread. These characters have to have this argument and it has to happen this way. John Darnielle’s delivery has a robotic quality to it that works alongside the drum. You can almost feel the fist pounding the table to punctuate each word in the chorus of “that’s not true // that’s a rotten thing to say // that’s a damnable lie.”

Your enjoyment of “Going to Malibu” may vary. It’s definitely a weird song, even for the early ones, and the delivery and backing drum do lack the raw emotion that makes much of the early catalog so passionate. For me, this song wouldn’t work any other way. It’s intended to be a battlefield by the use of “neutral ground” and the battle march aesthetic is a logical choice. Lines like “the thoughts that race around my mind // could fill a long unreadable book” are worth the sound quality, and if you can put yourself in the non-magic shoes of the narrator, you might appreciate why they feels like they’re going to war.