Protein Source of the Future…Now!

098. Going to Tennessee

Alex Russell Protein Source of the Future...Now!, Why You All So Thief? , , , , , , , ,

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bLSgWd8jbk

Two lovers share a quiet moment and feel a different kind of warmth as the sun sets in Memphis in “Going to Tennessee.”

Track: “Going to Tennessee”
Album: Why You All So Thief? (1994) and Protein Source of the Future…Now! (1999)

John Darnielle loves geography. There are at least 50 “Going to…” songs in the catalog, but I never expected to find one about my hometown. I’m from Memphis, Tennessee, which is a far less exotic location than Bolivia or Denmark or Malibu, but it’s a specific kind of place that conjures an image in your mind even if you haven’t been there.

Darnielle’s song “Going to Tennessee” is heavy on specifics even though it avoids the ones you’d think. There’s no Elvis or Beale Street or anything even like them. We only get scattered facts, like the lack of a baseball team and the presence of Arkansas nearby.

“Going to Tennessee” uses specificity to set the stage on the Mississippi River in Memphis, but it’s after more general emotions. The couple lives close to the interstate and they share tender moments in their likely dingy apartment. One washes their face and the other says “I am glad I am alive,” which is an extremely rare sentence in a Mountain Goats song. We’re left to discern that they share at least a kind of love. That’s not uncommon by itself, but these two exit their song in an interesting place.

John Darnielle has said the song is about “cheating death” and there is no better way to feel like you’ve gotten one over on the end times than to feel boundless love. The sun is setting in one of the hottest towns in America, but the couple describes their skin as “warming up.” It’s not solely a love song, but that ending suggests at least one more day of joy for two people in the Bluff City.

054. Fresh Berries for You

Alex Russell Protein Source of the Future...Now! , , , , , , , ,

 

On one of the strangest and best songs from the early years, John Darnielle invokes the Easter Bunny as a portent.

Track: “Fresh Berries for You”
Album: Chile de Árbol (1993) and Protein Source of the Future…Now! (1999)

At a show in 1999 in Bloomington, Indiana, a man called out for “the Easter Bunny song.” That night in Bloomington included “Cutter,” (which is about being born in Bloomington and is introduced as such) “Letter from a Motel,” “Tampa,” “You’re in Maya,” and “Poltergeist.” It’s one of those holy grail shows you dream of when you read a set list. It’s the kind of show that doesn’t happen anymore because it couldn’t happen anymore. You can still hear “the Easter Bunny song” though, or you could if you went to the show at the Old Town School of Folk Music in 2014 in Chicago.

Sometimes it’s obvious why a song from the early days persists. “Going to Alaska” is from the very first album, but it still gets play at solo John Darnielle shows because it’s fantastic. It’s a great song, but it’s also tonally appropriate alongside the more modern Mountain Goats songs. “Fresh Berries for You” is an entirely different beast. While certainly not common now, it’s the kind of “kinda funny” song that you’d expect to have been swallowed up by history. It’s good that it hasn’t been. It may be the best song on Chile de Árbol (depending on your ability to appreciate what “Going to Malibu” is going for, but that’s a conversation for another day) and it’s one of the most interesting songs from pre-1995.

John Darnielle’s narrator is insistent that the person they’re addressing is in for a treat. “The time is coming,” they repeat, and “it’s gonna be so nice // when the Easter Bunny comes.” Exactly what that means for everyone involved is left deliberately unclear, but it’s a testament to the other narrators of Goats songs that you can’t help but wonder how bad this is going to go.

034. Omega Blaster

Alex Russell Protein Source of the Future...Now!, Yam, the King of Crops , , , , , , , , ,

In “Omega Blaster” the problems of two people feel enormous despite the lack of their ultimate impact on the world.

Track: “Omega Blaster”
Album: Yam, the King of Crops (1994) and Protein Source of the Future…Now! (1999)

It would have been much harder to get a handle on this whole catalog in the mid 90s. The first releases date back to 1991, but aside from the first album itself, most of the early stuff has been re-released on compilations like Protein Source of the Future….Now! which has selections from eight different releases. All of Yam, the King of Crops is on Protein Source, and since John Darnielle once said Yam, the King of Crops was his favorite album of his (that may or may not have changed by now, but it was at least once true) it is worth digging up if only for that reason.

“Omega Blaster” is a quiet song, sung almost in a whisper. John sounds far away in the recording, and it imbues the narrator with a kind of distant sadness about the divorce/breakup the song foretells. In the liner notes on Protein Source, John says “the narrators of these songs seem often to give near-apocalyptic weight to their petty grievances, and I am quite sure that some of them would gladly trade the fate of the world for a few hours of relative happiness.” What better summary of the end of a relationship is there?

“And I am leaving you // and I am sorry” is a very simple refrain for a song about the end of love, but in that sense it’s very malleable. Whatever experience you want to drape “Omega Blaster” over will conform to be covered by it. If you are the hurt one or not — or if it’s not really clear which you are — you can whisper along with the character as they feel the heat of an unreturned smile and the sadness of thoughtful gifts, given too late.