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.