Never Mind The Bolex

10 Plays

The Mountain Goats - These Damn Vampires

New track off the upcoming All Eternals Deck. Can’t wait for the album.

“Darnielle’s spoken about how “the songs cluster around themes of hidden things and the dread that hidden things inspire” and “the excitement, the attraction, the magnetic draw that scary unknown hidden things exert.” He’s said “other possible points of reference” include “‘Burnt Offerings,’ ‘Go Ask Alice,’ and that one scene in ‘The Warriors’ where they’re on the train and the sun’s coming up and they’re safe but you know the scars are permanent now.” We’re also told the title All Eternals Deck refers to “an apocryphal tarot deck.” It’s fun excavating Darnielle’s work, as always, and you might as well get started at the beginning with this opener, the Congleton-produced “Damn These Vampires,” one that plays on this horror flick thing (“God damn these bite marks deep in my arteries…”) as a classic Western. Or at least a story that can be told using genre imagery: “Brave young cowboys of the near north side / mount those bridge rails, ride all night / scream when captured: arch your back / let this whole town hear your knuckles crack…” This is a Mountain Goats album best experienced through headphones, so maybe don those.”

(Source: stereogum.com)

81 Plays

Superchunk - Digging for Something (feat. John Darnielle on backing vocals)

Currently  Digging: This album.

Another choice track: Winter Games

40 Plays

The Mountain Goats - The Mummy’s Hand

Part two of our theme.

I am wrapped in scraps of linen and pieces of people's old shirts.
but way way underneath all these sticky bands, I hold all my dreams right here in my hands.

I will rise from the tomb like an infant emerging from the womb.

I spent several thousand years down here all alone.
no way to stand the lonely old ache in my bones.
say the spell three times, crank up the special effects,
I'm gonna cast off all my bandages and see what happens next.

82 Plays

The Mountain Goats - Bride

I forgot about this song until recently, it made me wish more people wrote love songs from the point of view of reanimated, stitched together monsters.

designed for one another
we lay tied to our slabs
while the same electricity that gave us life
crackles through the lab

and I am too dumb
to tell you how I feel
who will know, who will tell anyone
that what we had was real

we belong dead
we belong dead

41 Plays

The Mountain Goats - Commandante

i'm gonna drink more whiskey than brendan behan.
and i'm gonna send my belongings all to tripoli.
and i'm gonna ride home to california
with a banjo on my knee.

i'm never gonna turn off the television.
i'm just gonna let it run all night.
i'm gonna plant root vegetables out in the backyard
and come summer i am going to treat you right.

so put on your chairman mao coat
and let me clear my throat.
let's turn this whole town upside-down
and shake it 'til the coins come falling out of its pockets,
yeah put on your che guevara pin
call the troops on in
we're gonna sail through the night sky like a pair of bottle rockets.

i got a great big secret written down somewhere.
i got a rosary to protect us both from harm.
i got a storage locker full of cow figurines
and a laundry list of grievances longer than my arm.
and i am never going back to cincinatti.
all those bridges have burned down to the ground.
i got the jet pack strapped to my back
and i am waiting for you to come around.

180 Plays • Download

The Mountain Goats - Alpha Rats Nets

Ah the lengthening hours in the refinery
Belching fire into the sky
We do our best vampire routines
As we suck the dying hours dry
The night is lovely as a rose
If I see sunlight hit you
I am sure that we’ll both decompose

Ah the fitful sleep and the fire engines
That I dream of when I dream
Some day we’ll both wake up for good
I will try hard not to scream
The evening wind will shake the blinds
You’re stirring from your slumber
We’ve got something hateful on our minds

Oh sing sing sing
For the dying of the day
Sing for the flames that will rip through here
And the smoke that will carry us away
Yeah sing for the damage we’ve done
And the worse things that we’ll do
Open your mouth up and sing for me now
And I will sing for you 

Something in the air.