The Mountain Goats

Also: gone.

said there will be more made, discouraging ppl from paying eBay prices

Yup, onto a third printing now.

feel a bit iffy about making such calls in praesentia creatori but this new release is probably my favourite first-listen to any of their albums

he's still on here? I thought all his posts were from the early days of ILM.

Yes, incognito, local custom is to not discuss it too much.

Went back to All Eternals Deck today. Such a great album, some of my favourite TMG songs. High Hawk Season is incredible.

Amazing consistency.

TMG makes me feel more like a human and less like the ego piece of shit that I guess I am

New album in October:

https://themountaingoats.bandcamp.com/album/getting-into-knives

New Song!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Otp5VzITCgs

My cousin "got into" knives and his instagram turned kind of creepy full of demonstration videos of fancy artisan knives cutting objects in half.

I like how the last 4 or so full-band album titles each seemed geared toward some demo of fandom (wrestling, goths, D&D/MtG, Cold Steel).

this is cool

and I have to tell you in case anybody misses it: the organ on the new song? That swelling, throbbing, miraculous Hammond B3? that's CHARLES HODGES. THE GUY WHO WROTE THE "LET'S STAY TOGETHER" ORGAN LINE. "TAKE ME TO THE RIVER." "LOVE AND HAPPINESS." ~THAT~ GUY pic.twitter.com/UDK8fcIRHO

— The Mountain Goats (@mountain_goats) August 11, 2020

wow

More on said song, including Whiney cameo (really)

because I have waited months to talk about our new stuff here's a thread about what's happening on this song. please do subscribe to our YouTube channel I hate to ask but I'm supposed to. https://t.co/vZ20jK2jZR

— The Mountain Goats (@mountain_goats) August 11, 2020

Appreciating the COVID haircut game here:

https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,fl_progressive,pg_1,q_80,w_1600/srn0ph9rmqihdynupab9.jpg

A marvelous song.

...are those not pre-COVID haircuts, from a time when people could rub their faces on each other in a room?

also from a time when you could visit a stylist which they have all clearly done?

now I'm zooming in to figure out if that's a seam on Hughes' shoulder or they've all been composited in

ENHANCE

Forced perspective. JD is at the back of the room and he is also eighteen feet tall.

...are those not pre-COVID haircuts, from a time when people could rub their faces on each other in a room?

― Steppin' RZA (sic), Tuesday, August 11, 2020 4:52 PM (three days ago) bookmarkflaglink

also from a time when you could visit a stylist which they have all clearly done?

― Give me a Chad Smith-type feel (map), Tuesday, August 11, 2020 5:06 PM (three days ago) bookmarkflaglink

not that I would know but I have it on fairly good authority that none of these people have visited a stylist in 2020 and that this hair is 100% "what happens when you just let it go"

(The pictures were taken last week. When your gig means you have to do a picture, even in a pandemic, you just sort of have to cross your fingers.)

Matt knows how to work his own pomade.

'Getting Into Knives', eh? Am I gonna have to ban the Mountain Goats now too?

(j/k, looking forward to this!)

the sound of this song (arrangement + production) reminds me of the Okkervil River album I Am Very Far - orchestral, live-sounding, lightly gothy. I like that sound a lot.

Another song from the new album:

https://www.mergerecords.com/the-mountain-goats-are-ready-to-get-famous

fyi before clicking: it's a 29-second clip on Spotify if you don't have an account with that company

fyi before NOT clicking: there are other things on the page including words from John and a link to a page with links to non-Spotify places to listen to and buy the song and also buy the new album

good looking out: https://themountaingoats.bandcamp.com/track/get-famous

Okay, this is great:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qH7nWoRXSKo

New track from the album up:

https://themountaingoats.bandcamp.com/track/picture-of-my-dress

About it, plus a sad note about its recording:

On New Year's Day 2019, now a distant world away, Maggie Smith, author of "Good Bones," tweeted a plotline for an imaginary buddy movie about a divorced woman driving around the US with her wedding dress, taking it all around the country. I thought to myself: what if she's taking it to places she didn't go when she was married, what if she's showing her dress the life she didn't live? I hunkered down and a couple hours later I'd written "Picture of My Dress." In March of 2020, also now a distant world away, we recorded the tune with Matt Ross-Spang at Sam Phillips in Memphis. Playing on the track are the Mountain Goats -- John, Peter, Jon, and Matt -- plus Bram Gielen and Chris Boerner for that extra sweetness. We were assisted in the studio by one hell of a nice guy named Matt Denham, who died unexpectedly this week and we are all torn up about it because he was a real one so I am sending this out to you, bud. Everybody else give an extra head-nod while you listen to the studio attaché with the gentle way, a song like this can only be the result of everybody in the room being on the same wavelength and his contribution was a special energy that this world will miss but the next one is presently richer for. Enjoy!

An obituary for Denham can be found here. Based on the many notes on the tribute wall via this page, he was deeply loved:

https://www.colemanfuneralhome.com/obituaries/Matthew-Denham/#!/Obituary

The online show tonight was very lovely. Look forward to next week's too.

Also really loved the show tonight, and having the chat to get excited with was a great touch. Can’t wait for next week’s stream.

Looking forward to next week’s as well. Absolutely loved the Springsteenified Heel Turn 2 outro

New album is very rewarding. Lots of big tunes on it. I keep yelling along to Get Famous. Bell Swamp Connection and The Last Place I Saw You Alive are as goosebumpy as MG songs can be

Don't sleep on "Great Gold Sheep" and "Rat Queen."

Trueee

Wow---two in one year, this year, has my head bouncing back toward a particular fave as well (for instance)---from my P&J Top Ten comments:
The Mountain Goats--- Transcendental Youth No need to tunnel back into your Mountain Goats stash for comparative purposes; this album stands (leaps, eats tin cans) on its own terms, which acolytes and novices alike will recognize--not because it's a re-hash; just that all these coded hoodrat catacomb testimonies make unmistakably American sense. if you are a The Hold Steady fan but getting a bit frustrated with creative lovehandles, rest assured this contains no fat, does bring plenty crucial lyric and sonic detail, with hungry underdog cunning, zig-zag wandering and straight-ahead momentum. Also, if you're frustrated by good horn sections wasted on, say the Byrne/St. Vincent thing (yeah I'll listen again, or maybe not), well you've come to the right place, as Elvis would say. Kind of a King Creole urban twilight pang-vibe here, times art-rocking MGs leader John Darnielle's metal-compatible spirit too.

Putting this on for the first time, I'm moved to wonder whether Belle & Sebastian is a reference point! I mean that in a nice way obviously. (There's a non-nice way?)

wau @ Rat Queen

i need to check this out, "get famous" was a real bummer for me, so on the nose and obvious we live in a society stuff, kinda weird for such a great lyricist

Don't know how far back you want to go w the jangle, morrisp, but you might like Fields/Aquamarine, which is a reissue of the album and EP by the Individuals, who were one of the Hoboken Three, along with the Bongos and dBs, back in the late 70s and maybe early 80s, real good and you can read all about them on bar-none.com, along with other releases of related interest, like ones by the Feelies and Alex Chilton.
Also I'd try the Bongos and dB's, and reissue comp of pre-dBs' incarnation the Scruffs, along with Big Star, the Shoes' Black Vinyl Shoes, the Bangles, the Records, 20/20, prob a lot more on YouTube etc. I haven't thought of.

And speaking of the dBs, Holsapple and Stamey have reworked some band material for the mostly acoustic Our Back Pages in Omnivore's MusiCares Covid-19 Relief Fund series (which also incl. an NRBQ set):
...Signature dB’s songs, including “Black and White,” “Big Brown Eyes,” and “Happenstance,” are ably propelled here by lyric and guitar energy alone, and the hooks remain — it’s easy to find one’s self singing along. Tunes such as “Dynamite” and “From a Window to a Screen” are revealed as precursors to the music the two made together later, as they feature “dual lead,” close-harmony vocals as essential elements. Others, such as Peter’s “Today Could Be the Day” and “Molly Says,” were originally recorded by the band after Stamey’s departure, so this marks the first time he’s gone on record with them. When going through the material in preparation for mastering, they even discovered a forgotten track, “Depth of Field,” and completed it for this release; although a version had appeared on a Stamey solo record, it fits in here because it was originally written and rehearsed contemporaneously with the rest for The dB’s’ second album, Repercussion.

Another song, “Picture Sleeve,” is both old and new. A song by this title was in the band’s sets circa 1978, but all that anyone could remember, years later, were the first few lines, some chords, and the subject matter. Using those elements as a jumping-off point, it was rewritten for a Record Store Day single release three decades later, and a duo version is part of this release. Peter’s classic ballad “Nothing Is Wrong,” a staple of their live duo sets, was overlooked during the original sessions and sadly missed. Fortunately, it’s included on this new collection in a version The dB’s themselves recorded during a rehearsal in New York City in 2008.

“We’re still proud of the electric versions of the songs,” Stamey insists, “but a sturdy song should be able to handle a bit of reinvention from time to time...In most cases, it’s a trip back in time to the songs’ origins of being written on acoustic guitars in apartments or hotels..."

A few special guests joined Holsapple and Stamey on the sessions: John Teer (Chatham County Line) and Libby Rodenbough (Mipso) both contribute violin, and Andy Burton (Little Steven, John Mayer, Cyndi Lauper) plays keys on “Nothing Is Wrong” with, of course, Rigby (drums) and Holder (bass). The mastering by Greg Calbi and Steve Fallone at Sterling Sound is a homecoming of sorts as legendary mastering engineer Calbi had previously mastered the pair’s influential Mavericks outing as well as Falling Off the Sky, the last dB’s album. For the most part, it’s Peter and Chris around the campfire at Modern Recording in Chapel Hill, N.C., grabbing whatever was in the room at the time: a toy piano, a ukulele, a banjo, a harmonium, an upright or an old Silvertone bass, and of course, guitars, guitars, guitars.

In addition to 1991’s Mavericks (RNA Records), Holsapple and Stamey also paired up for 2009’s hERE & nOW (Bar/None). For more insight into the genesis of some of these songs, see A Spy in the House of Loud: New York Songs and Stories (University of Texas Press), Stamey’s 2018 “songwriting memoir.” Be on the lookout for A Brand-New Shade of Blue, Chris’s new audio-and-songbook collection, currently slated for a summer 2020 release.

O shit, sorry! Was meant for Rolling Reissues!

Tonight's show is also lovely.

Holy shit, this new one is fantastic. I wasn't a big fan of "Get Famous", but I'm sold on the record. It's all about the back half, where it goes from another pretty good Mountain Goats record to, "holy shit, this might be one of the best of the Merge era".

I mean, this is just so gorgeous sounding - right now it's the guitars in "Harbor Me" that are killing me.

I already liked "Get Famous," but I otherwise agree. "Bell Swamp Connection" and "Wolf Count" are especially beautiful.