the mountain goats

188. Cao Dai Blowout

Alex Russell New Asian Cinema , , , , , , ,

“Cao Dai Blowout” is a ghost story that’s hiding a larger lesson about processing complicated feelings.

Track: “Cao Dai Blowout”
Album: New Asian Cinema (1998)

“Cao Dai Blowout” is about one narrator processing their father’s memory. They refer to a ghost that destroys all in its path, from street lights to simple items in the narrator’s home. The song builds with with guitar, banjo, and keyboard. The result is an effective rising as the narrator escalates descriptions of the ghost. “When the ghost of your father comes to town,” they moan, “what the hell else can you do?”

The payoff is a rejection of religious assistance (“when the priest came to call I sent him on his way”) and a surprising resolution. Many Mountain Goats songs build to a decision and veer off just before the climax, which allows us to wonder what specific problems narrators have and how we might feel about their actions. “Cao Dai Blowout” shows us a narrator that asks what can be done when overwhelmed with the presence of a dead parent and goes so far as to answer the question: “I let him set up shop.”

Caodaism is a Vietnamese religion that believes in an ultimate resolution where humanity and the divine will be as one. Supposedly, many prophets (including holy figures in most other world religions) have tried to tell us of this eventual moment, but we cannot yet perceive of this perfection. According to Caodaism, we will all reincarnate again and again until we are each ready to understand this and transcend.

The connection here to this song’s title is unclear to me, but it does draw to mind the smaller scale way we relate to our mothers and fathers. We will all be faced, eventually, with the decision of how to process their existence. John Darnielle offers up a solution to absorb all of it rather than fight, as this moment will happen until you do.

187. Sarcofago Live

Alex Russell Satanic Messiah , , , , , , , ,

“Sarcofago Live” gets to the heart of what matters to a fan and how other things fall away.

Track: “Sarcofago Live”
Album: Satanic Messiah (2008)

You don’t have to like everything that your heroes like. John Darnielle loves boxing, metal, and Amy Grant. It is possible to love the music of John Darnielle without loving any of these things. I do not love any of those things, especially. I’m not against them, they just aren’t holy to me.

“Sarcofago Live” is a song about a Brazilian metal band called Sarcofago. Wikipedia defines them as an “extreme metal” band. All of their members have outrageous pseudonyms. There is an extended description of their first album cover and the designer who balked at putting a crown of thorns on it. They clearly earn their “extreme” descriptor.

I have never heard a Sarcofago song. I don’t think it’s crucial to hear one to understand this song. I’ve never seen Pinklon Thomas box, but I love “Pinklon.” I eventually saw the movie detailed in “The Lady from Shanghai” but the song didn’t change for me after seeing it. One requires many reference materials (a Bible chief among them) to get all of the references in a Mountain Goats song, but it doesn’t always change the impact.

“Sarcofago Live” finds characters who want to take part in the only thing that matters to them at the end of the proverbial rope. They are in a “concrete room” and they are waiting. They need no food. They need no task. They just need Sarcofago. I am confident that it is good music, for the people who need it. Nothing is purely good or bad, it is what it is for people who find it and need it. There may be no more meta interpretation of a Mountain Goats song, but what fan doesn’t know what it means to wait for the only thing worth waiting for?

186. Jam Eater Blues

Alex Russell Jam Eater Blues , , , , ,

The simple pleasure of delicious jam offers a brief respite from — what else — Tampa in “Jam Eater Blues.”

Track: “Jam Eater Blues”
Album: Jam Eater Blues (2001)

The difference between jam and jelly is that jam has more pieces of actual fruit, so it’s chunkier. That’s why it’s easy to picture the narrator in “Jam Eater Blues” pawing jam out of a jar with just their hands as they ponder the world and their place in it.

“Life is too short to refrain from eating jam out of the jar” is a fine summary of the Mountain Goats’ mentality. Even the darker moments of the catalog affirm the need to act quickly and the importance of living without reservations. It’s the kind of statement you can see John Darnielle making and writing down in a notebook, wondering what he’ll end up using it for later. Then it shows up perfectly as the refrain in “Jam Eater Blues” and leads surprisingly into a song about the challenges of love.

Our narrator says they won’t stay up waiting for someone to come home, but they will eat jam. They won’t leave the windows open to take part in the world, but they will eat jam. They won’t live out their days in Tampa, a common symbol of dead ends in Mountain Goats songs, but they will eat jam. “Life is too short to let it go to waste like this,” they tell us, “but I never tasted jam before that tasted like this.” We can forgive the this/this rhyme because it explains the character so well. The vagueness of who is coming home and what Tampa and open windows mean to the narrator are in stark contrast with the pleasure of jam out of a jar. We don’t know what these problems mean, but we know what pigging out in joy to escape them feels like.

185. Million

Alex Russell Nothing for Juice , , , , , , ,

Never has a person bringing a blanket home seemed more sinister than in “Million.”

Track: “Million”
Album: Nothing for Juice (1996)

Iowa shows up from time to time in John Darnielle’s world. His second novel, Universal Harvester, considers the darker and stranger elements of what happens in a quiet, small community in the state. John Darnielle loves the idea of places many people either think they know but don’t or don’t even think they know. Whichever Iowa is for you, live show banter will help fill in the idea of places like Colo, Iowa, where so many of the mid-90s Mountain Goats songs were born.

“Million” opens with Finland, which couldn’t be further from Iowa, as our narrator returns home to the Midwest with a blanket. One person brings an Iowan a blanket from Finland in a quick song on Nothing for Juice that’s nestled between songs about addiction and madness. It’s a simple idea, but it’s deepened by the hard strums and the wavering delivery.

“The moon is high over Iowa at night,” John Darnielle repeats. This would generally be a description of something pleasant, but here it’s some kind of threat. The narrator notices “questions only a masochist would ask” in their lover’s “big brown eyes,” which is another odd confluence. We’re in picturesque country with description of flowers and moonlight and one character has traditionally positive features but there’s a sense that something worse is coming. “Million” feels creepy without being specific about what’s afoot, but don’t try to tell yourself it’s nothing as you listen to the final voice crack over “Iowa at night.”

184. Then the Letting Go

Alex Russell Nothing for Juice , , , , , , ,

 

“Then the Letting Go” opens Nothing for Juice with one look and little time to contemplate what we see.

Track: “Then the Letting Go”
Album: Nothing for Juice (1996)

“This is the hour of lead 
Remembered if outlived, 
As freezing persons recollect the snow – 
First chill, then stupor, then the letting go.” – Emily Dickinson

With whisper-quiet songs like “Waving at You” and “It Froze Me,” Nothing for Juice is a unique album. It does end up stomping and screaming in “Going to Scotland,” but it opens in New York with “Then the Letting Go.” The title comes from the final line of the an Emily Dickinson poem about dealing with difficult emotions. The poem reflects on how one’s heart feels and how the effects of pain can linger before concluding with a grim image. There is a hopeful way to view it, sure, but it seems more likely that your final act is to “let go” in this context.

It seems like an odd choice for an opener. John Darnielle and Rachel Ware harmonize well and it’s one of the stronger songs on the album as a result, but it feels very brief. The song opens with “Down home in the South Bronx // down home” and “Saw you walking down the street again // saw you looking sweet again,” both lines that repeat the same ideas and expand them only slightly. The changes are small, but they add depth. It closes in similar fashion, with one head turn from the narrator and four questions that start with “why.” Many Mountain Goats songs are smaller collections of images, but few of them are just one look. We get just this one image of a narrator looking at a lover, a friend, or death itself, and then we’re gone.

183. Star Dusting

Alex Russell Bitter Melon Farm, Transmissions to Horace , , , , , , , , ,

In a casino in old Las Vegas, the Alpha Couple tries and fails to communicate.

Track: “Star Dusting”
Album: Transmissions to Horace (1993) and Bitter Melon Farm (1999)

The Stardust Resort and Casino stood in Las Vegas for decades. You probably would recognize the sign, it’s one of the iconic pieces of Vegas that you know even if you haven’t been there. The place isn’t around anymore; a company says they’re building a new Chinese-themed resort in a few years. The Wikipedia article for it is not well policed. One mundane fact includes ten separate citations, most of which are personal YouTube videos with memories and slideshows. The article is extremely long and includes a ton of asides and rambling details, all of which create an endearing sense of the love people felt for this defunct casino.

“Star Dusting” borrows the resort’s name and shows us an early day in the Alpha Couple’s lives. One mumbles at another and they attempt to communicate. It all breaks down as one perceives the sound of bells ringing out from the other’s throat. “I thought I heard bells ringing // But then I remembered that I no longer knew what bells sounded like” is pure John Darnielle, with a very confusing image crammed into two lines. The song lazes along over slow guitar and the droning delivery of a drunken evening in Las Vegas. These two have spent a year in this place and it’s definitely not going to get any better any time soon. John Darnielle opens the song by stating the date and saying “this is a horror story,” and you can feel the tension build. It all won’t pay off in explosion for over a decade, but the anger of “No Children” is already there.

182. This Year

Alex Russell The Sunset Tree , , , , , , , ,

“This Year” is a song for every feeling, good or bad, and serves as a perfect New Year’s Eve anthem.

Track: “This Year”
Album: The Sunset Tree (2005)

Where to start for a song about new beginnings? “This Year” is arguably the most popular song John Darnielle’s ever written. It gets played at almost every show and is a bonding experience like no other track. The whole crowd will yell the “hail Satan” or “I hope we both die” lines, sure, but people lose their mind for the chorus of “This Year.” It’s a time to think about either the moments this year that make the song relevant for you or the moments next year that will blow those all away.

It’s positive and negative, which is fitting for a John Darnielle song. Teenage John Darnielle plays video games, drives recklessly, and drinks to avoid the miserable elements of his life. He rebels, above all else, and finds some forward progress through that rebellion. “Lion’s Teeth” is angrier, but what is more triumphant? Nothing, which earns “This Year” a spot in every single fan’s top five.

In recent years, John Darnielle has started posting on Twitter on New Year’s Eve to express his gratitude and his hope that the message of “This Year” endures. This year, he mentioned how the chorus was a placeholder that Peter Hughes told him to keep. It’s simple: “I am going to make it through this year if it kills me.” No matter what kind of year you’ve had, as you look back on it, keep going. That’s the message of the Mountain Goats and it’s as good a piece of advice as you’re ever going to get.

180. An Inscription at Salonae

Alex Russell Jack and Faye , , , , , , ,

 

A narrator makes a hard choice and lives with it among a deceptive setting in “An Inscription at Salonae.”

Track: “An Inscription at Salonae”
Album: Jack and Faye (Unreleased, recorded 1995 or 1996)

Jack and Faye is a four-song, unreleased EP from the final days of the John Darnielle and Rachel Ware Mountain Goats. All four songs feature one person talking to another person about a shared past. It’s probably not intentional, but it’s a fitting way for the original Mountain Goats lineup to end their time together.

Salona was a city in ancient Rome and is located in modern-day Croatia. The characters from “An Inscription at Salonae” live there, thousands of years ago, and are involved in some heavy activity. The song opens peacefully enough with images of women playing tambourines and men blowing trumpets. The song has a bouncy feel to it that suggests this might be a feast or a party, but the lyrics quickly depart from the tone of the song.

The narrator repeatedly mentions that they are “falling to pieces.” The source of their strife becomes clear with mention of “a young man on the altar” that they are poised above. One person watches from the crowd as the other makes a hard choice above a child on an altar. We can assume what happens.

John Darnielle loves to spend time in unfamiliar settings. Ancient times come up a lot, since we can quickly relate to other humans but struggle to contextualize their limited understanding of the world. This interaction is a brutal one, most likely, and the narrator says “it was not that long ago // but the memory’s kinda dying out, you know.” We can take that to mean that this isn’t someone to root for, but it seems more likely that this is  compartmentalization. The inscription in the title is on a headstone and though death was more part of daily life in Salona than now, we all still have to process the unprocessable.

 

179. Orange Ball of Pain

Alex Russell Nothing for Juice , , , , , , ,

 

Two characters consider a delicious treat and ignore the encroaching world in “Orange Ball of Pain.”

Track: “Orange Ball of Pain”
Album: Nothing for Juice (1996)

The four “Orange Ball” songs may not be connected by anything more than their names, but it’s hard not to think about them together. They cover the emotions of the early Mountain Goats well, with two “lighter” songs, one “angry” one, and the predictably sad “Orange Ball of Pain.”

John Darnielle almost whispers the song, similar to his delivery on other Nothing for Juice tracks “Waving at You” and “It Froze Me.” Thematically, they’re not connected (the former is about divorce and the latter is a love song, so, not too connected) but the style is unmistakable. Nothing for Juice rises and falls repeatedly, with explosions like “Full Flower” and “Going to Kansas” interrupting quiet ruminations on when it all went wrong and the times it didn’t, before those other times.

In contrast with the whisper and quiet guitar, “Orange Ball of Pain” opens with some hope. The narrator brings home an unspecified baked good and offers some to another character. “And then the cold sorrow gripped me by the throat” breaks the mood, before some closing lines about the unrelenting nature of snow in the characters’ lives.

John Darnielle specifically mentions sorrow and sadness and the song is called “Orange Ball of Pain.” It’s somber, but it’s largely about eating a delicious dessert. So many Mountain Goats songs stop and relish a delicious fruit or a pleasant burst of natural beauty amid other disaster, but few spend this much time there. Given the other material on Nothing for Juice, it seems likely that even though the diversion is lengthy it may not be enough to carry them through. You should still eat the cake, even if it won’t save you.

178. The Recognition Scene

Alex Russell Sweden , , , , , , ,

“The Recognition Scene” chooses an unlikely location to show us a familiar event in our lives.

Track: “The Recognition Scene”
Album: Sweden (1995)

Sweden opens with a couple stealing candy from a store. In “The Recognition Scene,” they grab huge quantities of garbage food and drive around eating it, unsure of what their actions mean. It’s an interesting crime, and the seemingly low stakes nature of it doesn’t tell us if these are hardened criminals or just normal junkies.

The key to “The Recognition Scene” is in the refrain: “I’m gonna miss you when you’re gone.” The narrator senses that an end is coming, even if it’s at least months away. They describe a “three-month ride” after the robbery, so we know as an audience that there is time to come. That doesn’t necessarily mean it will be happy time, of course, and continued presence of characters in Mountain Goats songs definitely doesn’t imply that it will always be a positive experience.

A “recognition scene” is a moment in film or literature where one or more characters has a sudden flash of understanding. It can mean a big reveal (he was dead the whole time) or a more subtle one (he’s not the man I thought he was). In this case, we don’t know what the characters learn about each other. They might not know themselves, as the narrator says “I saw something written in tall clear letters on your face // but I could not break the code.”

It is enough to know that this scene told the narrator it is going to be over, eventually. In bad stories characters explode and yell at each other to signify the end, but more often it is like this. They both know, from this moment filled with illegal Snickers and Skittles, it is not going to last, but there’s still three-plus months to go.