After last year’s excellent album Heretic Pride, The Mountain Goats 17th album The Life of the World To Come is a little disappointing. Granted, it has its high points, but while Heretic Pride was teaming with stand out tracks, The Life of the World To Come only really has a handful.
The song titles alone should have been a warning, each named after a passage in the bible that links in with an aspect of singer songwriter John Darnielle’s life. Such a track list, consisting only of titles such as ‘Deuteronomy 2:10’ and ‘Genesis 30:3’, is perhaps a Christian link too far for The Mountain Goats.
Granted, Christian themed song titles are not unusual for The Mountain Goats, which started life as a solo project of Darnielle before becoming a three-piece featuring bassist Peter Hughes and Jon Wurster on drums. The track ‘Heretic Pride’ for one, and last year’s ‘Satanic Messiah’, released on the Satanic Messiah EP. But to have a whole album of Bible passage song titles is a whole different proposition.
To the high points first. Second track ‘Psalms 40:2’ is wonderful, more akin to Heretic Pride’s upbeat sound, with its chugging guitar and bullet-like drumming from Wurster.
‘Psalms 40:2’ also encapsulates all that is distinct in Darnielle’s voice. While for some his voice is too nasally, for others the vocals perfectly fit the songs, in particularly when he addresses a recurring theme – that of the traumatised youth, struggling to keep his inner demons and simmering rage at bay. When Darnielle sings, “in the burning fuselage of my days,” on ‘Psalms 40:2’ the listener is left in no doubt of the power and passion he puts into his songwriting
Final track ‘Ezekiel 7 and the Permanent Efficacy of Grace’ is the other standout. Piano and vocals in the main, with only the hint of a heartbeat in the drums. It is a powerful song indeed.
However, most of the album is far less effective, in particular the dour opener, ‘I Samuel 15:23’.The emphasis on piano rather than guitar on the album doesn’t always hit the mark. The piano tracks work well with ‘Ezekiel 7 and the Permanent Efficacy of Grace’ but less so on others such as ‘1 John 4:16’
It would be wrong to say The Life of the World To Come is a bad album. It will delight fans of The Mountain Goats first high production albums such as Tallahassee, but lacks that particular album’s depth and melody. It is also far less upbeat and consistent than recent albums. The bar was set so high with Heretic Pride and its predecessor Sunset Tree, that The Life of the World To Come can’t help fall slightly flat in comparison. Despite that Darnielle is still perhaps the US’s most gifted songwriter and tracks such as
‘Ezekiel 7 and the Permanent Efficacy of Grace’ showcase a genuine power that is lacking in so much other music.
7/10
by Joe Lepper, Oct 2009
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