Martial Arts Weekend

376. Going to Michigan

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , ,

With two relatively obscure references, “Going to Michigan” takes you on a drive you might not be able to handle without protest.

Track: “Going to Michigan”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

I cannot tell you why the studio version of “Going to Michigan” is not on YouTube, but the live version I’ve included here has no meaningful differences from it. What I really should include, but cannot due to an unnecessary, but specific code, is this version of the song when it was called “Going to Detroit.” That version includes an explanation from John Darnielle about why the song didn’t make the final cut for Nothing for Juice in 1996. There aren’t really any differences across every version of this song, which is, in a way, noteworthy. I have a memory of hearing one where the band changed out the two musical references, but I can’t validate that.

Gary Newman was a new wave musician who I know only for the single “Cars.” The second reference is even more obscure, at least to me personally, as Blue Cheer was a psychedelic band from the 1960s and 1970s that took their name from a specific kind of acid. I assumed when I first heard this song decades ago that both were references to things that would be overly specific to listen to in a car trip that ostensibly was shared space with someone else. Reducing these references to that joke may not be strictly accurate, but I’ve always viewed this as the evolved version of something like “Anti-Music Song.” I am sure these aren’t intended with the same vitriol, but you do get a vibe that you’re supposed to at least be surprised. It’s an odd one, even if you assume that much about that part, but maybe you, like the narrator, do know exactly what that burning white rose is about.

375. Going to Marrakesh

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , ,

Through some powerful comparisons, “Going to Marrakesh” makes a damning statement about what it means to be in love forever.

Track: “Going to Marrakesh”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

For my money, “Going to Marrakesh” is the closest of all the Extra Glenns songs to being a Mountain Goats song. I’m sure on any given day that answer might change, but surely you can hear what I’m talking about. Part of it is the delivery, with John Darnielle’s high notes and the way his voice acknowledges the humor of lines like “and our love is like Jesus, but worse.”

Interestingly, “Going to Marrakesh” ends with the title. Most of the “Going to” songs don’t even mention their location, with the title meant to call to mind a specific place and the people in the song, understandably, not referencing it beyond that. Marrakesh is a city in Morocco, which has a separate entry as “Going to Morocco” on the same album. Is this significant? Probably not, but a curious detail if you’re given to trying to connect seemingly unrelated songs.

The entire song is an extended comparison of love to things that can die. In verse one it’s a monster being drowned, in verse two it’s Jesus in the cave, and in verse three it’s a patient in a hospital. This is what makes me call it a Mountain Goats song is disguise, which is honestly not fair to the songwriting duo behind the Extra Glenns. Franklin Bruno obviously brings more adventurous instrumentation, at least for 2002-era Mountain Goats stuff, but he also unlocks an intensity of language that allows John Darnielle to feel comfortable with lines that share a tone with his other work, but are something different entirely.

374. Going to Morocco

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , ,

“Going to Morocco” is mysterious and strange, but the feeling is one you’ll instantly connect with.

Track: “Going to Morocco”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

It’s a little bit of a cheat to talk about another song in the space designated for “Going to Morocco,” but I must insist you listen to the back-to-back of “Going to Morocco” and “Carmen Cicero” from this live show in October of 2000. This is the quintessential version of both of them and they deserve to be connected as an experience. “Carmen Cicero” is famously live-only with no released version intended and I’ll be a little grandiose here and say that version is one of the best versions of any Mountain Goats (or Mountain Goats-adjacent) song, with an extra-intense (even for him) John Darnielle demanding the audience sing the chorus by saying “every last one of you, right now.”

“Going to Morocco” is connected to “Carmen Cicero” very loosely, and really this is just me stretching but go along with it, because it’s another really loud, really intense series of shouts. You cannot crack the meaning and maybe shouldn’t try. Segues like “if you won’t, I will” into “but there are no wolves around here” resist you at every turn. I am hesitant to say any song John Darnielle even has a hand in doesn’t mean anything, but I think “Going to Morocco” is more about the feeling than anything else. You can spend a lot of time reading about what a “guttural stop” is in linguistics or you can just let the guitar wash over you. I recommend the latter.

373. Ultraviolet

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , , ,

A narrator defiantly stands against a hostile world in the Extra Glenns song “Ultraviolet.”

Track: “Ultraviolet”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

John Darnielle has said two things of note about the Extra Glenns song “Ultraviolet.” He said it was a song about salvation, which makes sense given the lyrics. This is a song about someone going through something, which every song is in a way, but it’s expressly about protecting yourself and taking care of how you make it to tomorrow. He’s also said the title comes from a movie he was watching, which might make you think of the 2006 Milla Jovovich joint that people seem to really, truly hate, but the timeline doesn’t work. My best guess is that movie was a 1992 horror film about “psycho-sexual games,” but honestly, I think this is a mystery we can leave unsolved.

I love John Darnielle’s delivery of “I leaned a little while up against a barber pole” and the passionate ending. The whole song is about that ending for me, with the narrator who has “lost a quart of blood since Tuesday” demanding that they will not let someone take everything from them. “I didn’t let ’em take the very best part // the last lone bit of light left flickering in my heart” is a sentiment that dozens of Mountain Goats narrators could get behind, but it’s uniquely a Glenns song because of the instrumentation and the style. The extended outro lets you sit with that thought and invites you to wonder if you are protecting yourself as much as you should.

372. All Rooms Cable A/C Free Coffee

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , , ,

“All Rooms Cable A/C Free Coffee” fakes you out with the motel-sign title and sneaks away after just a taste of a story.

Track: “All Rooms Cable A/C Free Coffee”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

“All Rooms Cable A/C Free Coffee” is pretty clearly something John Darnielle and/or Franklin Bruno saw on a motel sign. You can run with that and picture this all happening in that motel or you can accept the song’s title as part of the pattern of odd, sometimes unrelated descriptors. I don’t think you’ll find an answer. Judging by my looking, you won’t find anything at all. This one’s never been played live, at least as far as the usual sources are concerned, and the closest thing to commentary about it I can find is a Tumblr post where someone used the lyrics in a drawing they made.

The Extra Glenns/Lens are odd to talk about because they are a side project, but one where John Darnielle sings most of it and the songs rarely stray far from themes of his band proper. This one fits in with that description, as a character observes image after image and feels a sense of impending pressure as they express love and/or longing. It’s extremely familiar territory for a Mountain Goats song, but jazzed up into a fuller sound than the band was experimenting with in 2002.

I’ve always loved this one for that first verse. “Wine and honey // lipstick and spit” is arresting, but “I’m not supposed to think your death wish is cool // but then I see you knocking back tequilas by the pool” is the killer. Tequila should generally only be pluralized in certain situations, and one where someone’s death wish is romanticized is one of them. This one is over so fast, but it definitely leaves you wanting to know more.

371. The River Song

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , , ,

Whether you seek out the live versions or enjoy the original, “The River Song” is a highlight, especially vocally.

Track: “The River Song”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

Eighteen years ago in Paris, John Darnielle and Peter Hughes “winged it” and played “The River Song” by request. Someone recorded, closer than you’d expect to be possible, and you can see it here. Given that it’s a song by The Extra Glenns, a band Peter Hughes isn’t in, John Darnielle initially says they can’t play it. John Darnielle, on stage, shares the chords with Peter Hughes and they go for it. This is extra notable because Peter Hughes even picks up the backing vocals. These guys have been in a band together for decades by now, but in 2003, watching them go for (and nail) a song that Peter has never played is really something.

It’s a sweet one, in tone if not entirely in message. John Darnielle hits a few high notes, as he does, but mostly speaks this one in low, gentle tones. It’s very wordy, even for an Extra Glenns song, and you get a real sense of who this character is as a result. The intro is over a minute and spreads out to set the stage. Martial Arts Weekend bounces around a few themes, but most of the songs can be read as love songs if that’s your thing. “The River Song” is the one that “feels” most like a love song, even with the mention of the water distribution plant failing. One must accept some things when one listens to The Extra Glenns.

370. Somebody Else’s Parking Lot in Sebastopol

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , ,

“Somebody Else’s Parking Lot in Sebastopol” finds a frantic narrator wailing into the sky at a particular manic low point.

Track: “Somebody Else’s Parking Lot in Sebastopol”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

In 1999, in Amsterdam, John Darnielle opened this show with a song that was then called “Somebody Else’s Parking Lot in Santa Cruz.” The show includes covers of Steely Dan’s “Doctor Wu” and Neutral Milk Hotel’s “Two-Headed Boy.” I encourage you to give it all a listen, but today we discuss the fact that he opened this show with a song that eventually became known as “Somebody Else’s Parking Lot in Sebastopol,” but the city in the title only changed a few years later. I’ve never been to Sebastopol, but I have seen Santa Cruz. It didn’t seem real to me, in the best way possible. I can’t speak for the city that occupies this song title now, much less why John Darnielle changed it, but someday I hope to see it to understand the comparison.

This song is decades old now and it probably wouldn’t work with the full band. Martial Arts Weekend was unique when it came out because it added a fuller sound, at least by way of electric guitar, to John Darnielle’s standard lyrical craft. This is not to diminish Franklin Bruno, an essential piece of The Extra Glenns/Lens and, honestly, the Mountain Goats overall, but people always focus on the guy singing. In this one, the narrator name drops two opera legends and calls for a swift end rather than having to face someone else. If you haven’t spent much time with John Darnielle’s side project, I think this is a good first one to try. The lyrics are top notch, both in unique description (calling to “the scale-tipper”) and typical Darnielle wordplay (“Of all the highs and lows and middle ends you brought me to // this is the worst place”).

369. Terminal Grain

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , , ,

“Terminal Grain” gives you something to nod your head to and something to wonder about for a very brief two minutes.

Track: “Terminal Grain”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

I am forced to use the video of a live performance for this post about “Terminal Grain,” which Spotify tells me is the least-played song from the 2002 The Extra Glenns release Martial Arts Weekend. There are no studio versions on YouTube, and the only other video at all is someone who appears to have recorded a garbled version of this live version by accident and uploaded it as a joke. Weird, huh?

I don’t know that play counts on Spotify matter much, but this is the first time in nearly 400 of these that I wasn’t able to find any version of a video of the studio version of this song. Just what to make of that is up to you, but it’s definitely a weird song. John Darnielle says at the end of the video above that he picked Sioux City, Iowa as a reference for the song because it sounded like a faraway place. At the time of that performance he lived in Iowa and it was no longer all that far away. Location seems to be about specificity and about hoping to imagine yourself somewhere else in a lot of Mountain Goats songs, so it’s not a stretch to apply that here.

I’ve always loved the studio version of this one but I am of the mind that there’s not much to unpack. It’s one of the explosion ones, over in under two minutes, and it’s as much about the feeling as the meaning. I’m overly fascinated by a lot of Mountain Goats (and Extra Glenns/Lens) details, but this one’s just a good time.

309. Baltimore

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , ,

With a catchy hook and a full sound, “Baltimore” shows you what you can expect from John Darnielle’s side project.

Track: “Baltimore”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

For my money, “Baltimore” is the best song on Martial Arts Weekend. I tend to listen to the second Extra Glenns/Lens album more than the first, but when I go back to the first I’m always enchanted with how it starts. Pitchfork called “Baltimore” a “back catalog echo song,” but did so in a review that says both that more electric guitar would be interesting and that all John Darnielle songs should be lo-fi, so make of that what you will.

The performance is what does it for me. It’s not all that interesting a song, lyrically, which is a shocking statement for a John Darnielle song, but also only true in comparison. It’s only a slight because of what else there is. What elevates “Baltimore” is exactly what Pitchfork seemed to find uninteresting. The composition stays beautiful, resisting the urge on a lot of early electric John Darnielle to fuzz out into panic or to shock with speed and rage. This is as pretty as John Darnielle is willing to get on a song with more than just quiet guitar.

It’s additionally remarkable that this came out in 2002, the same year as All Hail West Texas and Tallahassee. Neither of those albums sounds like this one, but you can imagine the people behind all of them being similar. “Baltimore” is a fitting start to an interesting diversion in the band’s work and it’s probably the most complete song from that album, though definitely not from those days.

140. Twelve Hands High

Alex Russell Martial Arts Weekend , , , , , , , , , ,

 

A horse crashes through a wall in “Twelve Hands High” to force a conversation between the Alpha Couple.

Track: “Twelve Hands High”
Album: Martial Arts Weekend (2002)

If you squint, most of the songs on Martial Arts Weekend could be love songs, but there really isn’t a theme that binds the whole thing together. It’s an Extra Glenns/Lens record, so it’s technically a side project that John Darnielle recorded with Franklin Bruno, but many of the songs have been played at Mountain Goats shows and I think that rounds it up to being part of the expanded Mountain Goats universe.

Saying there’s no uniting theme for Martial Arts Weekend isn’t an insult. It’s a fantastic album and is loud and bouncy compared to the other Glenns/Lens album Undercard. Both have standout tracks and belong in any fan’s top albums list, but they sit in stark stylistic contrast. Most of the cast on Undercard seems lost and lonely. The characters on Martial Arts Weekend aren’t happy, but they’re exuberant. They want to share their stories.

“Twelve Hands High” is also called “Fit Alpha Vi,” which is Latin for “alpha is violent,” roughly. John Darnielle says the idea behind it was originally a poem and predates his songwriting career. The version that made it to Martial Arts Weekend sees the Alpha Couple arguing about a horse. They’re angrier than they usually are and more direct, which is interesting. One tells the other that they feel “pressure bearing down” and the other has been sleeping on the lawn. John Darnielle raises his voice over “and there’s a different world waiting for me // when I lift my head up from your thick dark hair” and you can picture the scene. It took a horse crashing through a wall to make the Alpha Couple face their problems, but we know that this is only a moment of clarity before they’ll be back to drunken denial.