the mountain goats

105. Chinese House Flowers

Alex Russell Full Force Galesburg , , , , , , ,

 

The fierce “Chinese House Flowers” is suspiciously absent from live shows, but the one instance is magical. 

Track: “Chinese House Flowers”
Album: Full Force Galesburg (1997)

On September 11, 1996, John Darnielle played “Chinese House Flowers” at a concert venue called The Argo in Denton, Texas. It’s probably not the only time, but it’s the only time the good people at the Mountain Goats wiki list.

In various cars, apartments, backyards, and stranger venues I’ve played just about every song in the catalog for different people over the last decade. Just about everything — even the strangest of the strange — works for someone. “Chinese House Flowers” seems to work differently on me. People like it, but it doesn’t seem to get the same love as other fierce songs about love.

Chinese houses are purple and native to California. You can imagine mid-90s John Darnielle thinking of those flowers and home as he wrote Full Force Galesburg in Iowa. The album version features some trademark frantic strumming, but the selling point is the wavering, almost-terrified vocal track. His voice cracks over and over again and it drives home that this narrator is terrified. “I used to love you so much that I was sure it would kill me” could be a corny line in less deft hands, but it fits perfectly after “And just then the gleam in your eye // made my blood freeze” and other such expressions of fear.

Darnielle’s thoughts on the song aren’t obvious, though we can infer some things from the possible 20-year absence at live shows. If you’re like me and it works for you, I urge you to go check out that Denton recording. That venue’s long gone and Denton became immortalized far more famously by the Goats a few years later, but you should still go hear John Darnielle lose his mind over the chorus of “I want you more than I want anything // I want you the way you were.”

103. Straight Six

Alex Russell Jam Eater Blues , , , , , ,

 

Jenny shows up in “Straight Six” but the narrator has only the moon and their thoughts to help on a late drive.

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

Jenny can be a blessing or a curse in a Mountain Goats song. In “Jenny” she’s a symbol of tremendous hope for the narrator. That character and Jenny ride away from their troubles on a motorcycle and seemingly get away with it, at least in the moment. In “Night Light” she’s the lifeline that a terrified narrator needs to keep their sanity. They’re being pursued by external or internal demons and they get calls from Jenny that keeps them tethered to the real world.

The Jenny of “Straight Six” doesn’t seem to be as much help as her “Night Light” counterpart. In “Straight Six” she serves the same function as a proposed savior for the narrator, but she’s not likely to be as successful given that “Jenny’s on the cellular // high as a kite.” Considering how rarely characters in Goats songs actually get names it’s safe to assume that all three are the same Jenny and to view her as functionally the same character with the same purpose through the catalog.

“Straight Six” is the third and final song on Jam Eater Blues. The title track is, well, a blues song about making the most out of life’s simple pleasures. The middle track is a brutal look at specific, violent death and how it impacts us. The through line here is tough to find, but all three songs feature some form of introspection in a dark time. The trick is that they all find different outcomes. The narrator in “Straight Six” offers both possible outcomes to introspection on the single as they consider their troubles: “sometimes the moon shines like a beacon to the weary and the sick in spirit // and sometimes, sometimes it’s dark.”

102. The Lady from Shanghai

Alex Russell Bitter Melon Farm, Songs for Petronius , , , , , , , , , , ,

Named for an equally creepy Orson Welles movie, “The Lady from Shanghai” is unsettling in the best way possible.

Track: “The Lady from Shanghai”
Album: Songs for Petronius (1992) and Bitter Melon Farm (1999)

“‘The Lady from Shanghai,’ though — when I hear that comparatively young man get all breathy there, I see what he means, and I feel like he was onto something.” – John Darnielle, liner notes for Bitter Melon Farm

In 1947, Orson Welles wrote and directed a movie called The Lady from Shanghai. It occupies two places in cultural history. It’s either a masterpiece of noir or a tangled mess of indulgent Orson Welles stuff. Your perspective is your own, but it’s a classic and it’s one of the strangest experiences available on screen.

It’s strange to the point that some people seem to argue that it doesn’t make sense or flow as a narrative, but the basic points are pretty easy to follow. Orson Welles plays an Irish sailor who rescues Rita Hayworth during an attack in a park. Welles then discovers she’s married, but her husband hires him to man his yacht during a long, bizarre cruise that involves his lawyer and other strange figures who might not be what they seem. Everyone gets tangled in a plot and everyone has a secret motive, but can Welles untangle them all and save his life?

The song is breathy, as Darnielle notes, and it’s sung directly to someone. The film features frequent turns to camera where characters cackle or speak ominously. These are ostensibly to other characters, but they are directed straight at the audience. Both the song and the film create an eerie mood that will unsettle anyone who consumes either. The film really needs to be seen, but without viewing it you can still appreciate the state of mind of Darnielle’s characters. They’re wrapped up in something and all they can do now is walk towards their destiny.

101. Going to Kirby Sigston

Alex Russell Ghana , , , , , ,

“Going to Kirby Sigston” looks in on the life of two people in a town of 100 in the north of England.

Track: “Going to Kirby Sigston”
Album: Ghana (1999)

Kirby Sigston is home to 100 people. It’s just north of Leeds in England and it is 72 degrees Fahrenheit there today. In the early 90s, John Darnielle got a postcard from a friend in Kirby Sigston and was so taken by the name that he used it for “Going to Kirby Sigston.”

That’s how most of the “Going to…” songs seem to start. They’re as much about characters in different physical space as they are about listeners appreciating how important physical space is. When you listen you can imagine yourself in an impossibly small village in the English countryside and you can consider what differences that life would contain. The characters board up windows, dance outside, and eat “cold, black eggs” from their “special chicken.” It’s probably going to be a difficult adjustment for most of you.

The song itself is quick. It’s over in two verses and two minutes and it raises some nagging questions. This couple is less clearly defined than many in the catalog, so it’s hard to tell what their relationship is like. They seem happy enough, though dancing isn’t always a good sign in a Mountain Goats song. Depending on how you want to read it, the “I had a present for you hidden somewhere” line is either sweet or ominous. No matter how you take it, “Going to Kirby Sigston” is a short experiment about a couple trying to live a totally different kind of life. John Darnielle seems to allow that couple a few sweet moments, if nothing else.

100. Lovecraft in Brooklyn

Alex Russell Heretic Pride , , , , , , ,

John Darnielle channels the dark personality of H. P. Lovecraft more than the monsters in “Lovecraft in Brooklyn.”

Track: “Lovecraft in Brooklyn”
Album: Heretic Pride (2008)

H. P. Lovecraft is best known for creating the horrific monster Cthulhu and other fictional monster-gods. Even without knowing the man at all you can be assured that his worldview is a dark one. I haven’t read much Lovecraft, but it’s clear that he believes humanity to be inconsequential to the universe. The Old Ones in his stories are hateful, destructive beings that are either unaware of or uninterested in humanity’s desires or future.

Such a person is definitely at home in the Mountain Goats catalog. They’re much angrier than most of the narrators we have, but no less lonely. They’re at the end of their rope, perpetually. But this narrator isn’t Lovecraft himself, they’re just using the author as a parallel to their worldview. They say they “feel like Lovecraft in Brooklyn,” which requires that we understand a little about that specific time in the writer’s life.

Some misanthropes hate all of humanity and some hate specific parts of it more than others. Lovecraft is the latter, with specific hatred saved for non-English, white gentlemen. During his time in Brooklyn he was robbed and had a difficult time financially and he blamed his misfortunes on immigrants.

That’s the headspace for our narrator in “Lovecraft in Brooklyn.” They’ve set themselves against humanity in all forms. They view blood on the ground and monsters in the darkness of Brooklyn. They even imagine the end of their actual home.

It’s all dark, but it turns darkest towards the end. Our narrator goes to buy a switchblade and tells the pawn shop clerk about evil thoughts. When we see a sketchy stranger this is exactly who we hope it isn’t, but John Darnielle reminds us to look closer.

99. The Alphonse Mambo

Alex Russell The Coroner's Gambit , , , , , , ,

Tap your toe to “The Alphonse Mambo” and ponder the energy it takes to have the conversation you need (but don’t want) to have.

Track: “The Alphonse Mambo”
Album: The Coroner’s Gambit (2000)

The Mountain Goats Wiki is an amazing resource of live shows. This list makes a fair case that “The Alphonse Mambo” might be the most played song from the early Goats era. There are a lot of good reasons for that, but chief among them has to be that it bridges the beginning and the current day of the Mountain Goats. John Darnielle often describes himself in the early years as one guy stomping his foot with a guitar. These days his live shows combine huge, loud performances with a full band and quiet, uneasy piano songs that highlight the beauty in the strange and lonely people of our world.

“The Alphonse Mambo” is a stomper, for sure, but it’s also about a couple in distress. The song endures because it’s thematically appropriate around whatever other song he’s playing. There are often people in distress at the center of a Goats song, but Darnielle’s confirmed that this one only features the narrator. He’s working up the courage to have a tough conversation with someone else in this 16th floor room in Tampa Bay, but he’s going to need some more painkillers and some more courage to do it.

The live versions (especially the two at Farm Sanctuary, which you should seek out) highlight the song an all-timer, but the studio version has nearly as much of the fervor. You can hear John Darnielle shake as he sings the “waiting for the other shoe to drop in Tampa Bay” ending, and that teeth-clenched delivery sells the tension our narrator is feeling. They want to believe that they can get this whole thing done, but that period of “waiting for the other shoe to drop in Tampa Bay” might be a long one.

098. Going to Tennessee

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

 

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.

097. Sourdoire Valley Song

Alex Russell All Eternals Deck , , , , , , ,

John Darnielle asks us to consider the lives of ancient mankind in their own context in “Sourdoire Valley Song.”

Track: “Sourdoire Valley Song”
Album: All Eternals Deck (2011)

In the vein of “Tollund Man”, “Sourdoire Valley Song” makes us consider our elders. The titular valley is in France, where a 60,000-year-old neanderthal skeleton was discovered in 1908. Many people picture the discovery, but John Darnielle considers the life that man must have lived.

The opening verse talks about what we all know. “The Old Man” as he’s generally known sharpens new tools from old rocks and hunts game for the first time in history. He’s pleased with his tools and his process. He’s got the world on a string.

But the chorus complicates his simple life. The grass grows after he’s gone and covers his things and his existence. He’ll be hidden for thousands of years, though his ability to consider that is likely limited. He’s certainly unaware of the Olduvai Gorge in Africa, a more significant and much older site with remains of ancient humanity.

Both sets of ancient man led life as best they could. Darnielle doesn’t focus on the sad realities of life in “Sourdoire Valley Song.” Of course they will be forgotten for thousands (or millions, in Olduvai Gorge) of years, but for now they have remedies for sickness and they lead happy lives. They even have roots you chew for “atmosphere” which conjures some great images.

Towards the end of the song, Darnielle mentions that his ancient characters want to “live a long life.” They seem to believe this is possible with luck, which brings up something I’ve never considered. “Longevity” is relative. “The Old Man” died at 40, but who is to say that was a short life 60,000 years ago? Context is everything.

096. Tianchi Lake

Alex Russell Heretic Pride , , , , , , ,

“Tianchi Lake” references a being that’s mythical in our world but seems to be a normal part of the world of the Mountain Goats.

Track: “Tianchi Lake”
Album: Heretic Pride (2008)

The songs on Heretic Pride aren’t really connected. John Darnielle has said that they’re each about an obsession of his and that’s really as much as there is to go off. That isn’t much, but it’s enough for most of these. It’s certainly enough for “Tianchi Lake,” which is directly about a lake monster in China.

In the illustrated press kit that was released alongside Heretic Pride John Darnielle said “depending on whether you believe it or not, this is a true story, sort of.” That sums up the Mountain Goats’ relationship with the world of strange, mythical (maybe!) beasts. In Heaven Lake (or Tianchi) in China there supposedly exists a creature called the Lake Tianchi Monster. Some people report that it resembles a buffalo. Some say it has a human head. Some say that there are six of them and they all have wings.

In Darnielle’s song, it has the “body of a sea lion // head just like a horse.” The song is mostly a description of the lake and the monster, but there’s also an interesting commentary on how people react to it. Lots of our fear of the unknown comes from its nature as the unknown. Maybe you don’t really believe in ghosts or aliens, but maybe when you have thought about them you’ve been uncomfortable. Darnielle’s world allows for more direct interactions. The children, the preacher, and the crowd that see the monster in “Tianchi Lake” have solely positive or neutral reactions with the monster. That’s because they aren’t interacting with what might be, they’re just by a lake that has a known monster in it. The world of the Mountain Goats has monsters, yeah, but they’re less scary if you accept that as fact.

095. Wait for You

Alex Russell Babylon Springs EP , , , , , , ,

“Wait for You” closes an EP on a quiet, hopeless note as a character waits for someone who likely isn’t coming back.

Track: “Wait for You”
Album: Babylon Springs EP (2006)

The Babylon Springs EP covers all the emotions the Mountain Goats love to cover. “Ox Baker Triumphant” and “Alibi” open the album with rousing, screaming fury. Both characters make bad decisions that they feel they have to make to stay true to themselves. We can judge their intentions because we’re separate people, but in their minds they’re doing what must be done. “Sail Babylon Springs” and “Sometimes I Still Feel the Bruise” look inward at sad relationships past their prime (well past, in the latter’s case).

After you’ve made those two parallel journeys over four songs you’re left with “Wait for You.” It would seem impossible that a song could step down in mood from the crushing blows of “Sometimes I Still Feel the Bruise,” but leave it to John Darnielle to find the sadness in a rainbow.

In the second verse the character waits for a loved one that may be coming and may not. They see a rainbow in the distance and imagine that it “wrapped its coils around the earth like a serpent” to choke them. There are a handful of examples of this in Goats songs, but this is one of the best ones. Often normally hopeful or sweet imagery is twisted in the minds of Goats narrators, but it takes a special kind of darkness to see a portent in a rainbow.

By the end of the song the narrator has decided that the person they’re waiting for isn’t coming. That much is to be expected, but they do say that the waiting still serves a purpose. “But I waited all the same,” Darnielle says softly, and you appreciate the perspective of waiting for waiting’s sake on someone that is totally gone.