The Mountain Goats
The Life Of The World To Come
4AD; 2009
There is a distinct part of me that quails at the idea of breaking down the lyrics of one of the greatest active singer-songwriters currently putting pen to paper and word to melody. John Darnielle of The Mountain Goats might be the most prolific artist the average music fan has never heard of, but more importantly, he’s known for lyrics that are a sublime mix of metaphoric, literal, third-person omniscient, and first-person autobiographical. So, when I learned that each track from his new record, entitled The Life Of The World To Come, would be based upon and draw its name from a different verse from the Christian Bible, I was instantly intrigued and made very excited, mostly because Darnielle’s lyrics have always sounded to me like they’re straight out of one of David’s darker Psalms, the book of Job, or one of the creepier minor Old Testament prophets.
Thus, I decided to investigate the album track-by-track using the classic tools of the armchair theologian (or Monday-morning preacher): the primary source materials (the songs themselves), the contextual sources used to create the primary material (the Bible verses Darnielle references – I’ll be using the New Revised Standard Version), and the most cogent bit of commentary available on said primary material (the recent interview Darnielle conducted with Tom Breihan of Pitchfork Media). I realize that some people might consider this approach to be highly questionable at best or highly offensive to the actual songs and the songwriter himself at worst. Yet, when it comes down to it, I was so personally moved by and connected with the deep and dark (yet somehow hopeful) ruminations on death, dying, and the afterlife conveyed on this record that I couldn’t help but present my thoughts on these songs on an individual basis.
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