The Mountain Goats as we knew them are dead. In deference to that and Life of the World to Come’s Biblical theme (each song is named after a Bible verse), I was prepared to turn the other cheek, roll away the boulder, and evaluate them as an entirely new, if not exactly risen, entity. But that won’t be necessary, because Life, unlike the band’s last two albums, stands on its own in the Mountain Goats canon.
The Bible chic should be thrilling for any lapsed Catholics who still harbor fond memories of Sunday school, but titles are just a pious cover for what are some decently jamming songs. The band, built around singer John Darnielle and his acoustic guitar, has swelled into a panoply of instruments on their latest album, and the changes haven’t been all bad.
“Psalms 40: 2” brings back the old Mountain Goats’ running-and-gunning attitude, last seen on albums like Tallahassee and Coroner’s Gambit. There’s talk of “sleeping like infants” in Red Roof Inns (after leaving a trail of destruction behind you). It’s titled after a verse about being pulled out of slime and muck, though, so it pretty much had to be rocking.
While the album falters with mopey slow songs, Darnielle’s not to blame—mortality is. Since 2005’s Sunset Tree, about Darnielle’s abusive childhood, Mountain Goats albums have been increasingly introspective and death-focused.
The band always looked at death, but those songs were about murdered cavemen fossilized in swamps. Recently faced with an unnamed illness that forced him to cancel concert dates, Darnielle has traded that comforting distance for songs like “Philippians 3:20-21,” which examines the thin line between madness and prophecy right on a man’s deathbed.
For those of us who aren’t staring down the Grim Reaper, that sort of thing only goes so far. But with Life’s focus on resurrection, Darnielle offers his alienated fans some consolation—eventually, we’ll all be where he is now.
Voice’s Choices: “Psalms 40: 2”, “Genesis 3: 23”
