UPDATED with new photos and video below!
UPDATED AGAIN with MUCH MORE VIDEO!
I was ready. I’d been listening to Get Lonely, scanning the setlists and reading the post-show write-ups, and I was ready for a quiet show, heavy on the new material, engaging and thoughtful. I drank plenty of water to ensure I’d stay hydrated enough after several beers that a single, manly tear would have a chance to slide down my face during “Moon over Goldsboro” or “Song for Lonely Giants” before an all-too-brief singalong catharsis at the end of the show. I was ready.
And then this happened:
And that, my friends, is Mountain Goat John Darnielle rocking a Batman costume, which he continued to rock, cowl intermittent, throughout the rest of the show. Bassist Peter Hughes wore a freaky zombie-skeletor mask thing, and keyboardist/guitarist/embellishment wizard Franklin Bruno brought the spirit of Richard Simmons to the Spanish Moon.
Explained Darnielle as they took the stage: “You know how, when you take a person out, and then they won’t put out? We are not that person.”
Readers: this was not a concert. This was a happening. This was not something that can, or necessarily even should, be repeated. People didn’t just shout requests: they brought song-specific props and held them up until Darnielle relented (one couple came dressed as Dad With a Knife and Mom With a Saw from “Terror Song,” and were richly rewarded for their efforts.) I would say that nearly half of the crowd was in costume, but then again, at the indie rock show, isn’t everyone in costume? After a shaky start with “Love Love Love,” courtesy of the thick accretions of fecal matter that the soundboard monkeys left all over dials (they straightened it out, though, and pulled it off nicely), the band laid a delicate foundation of Get Lonely tunes and then proceeded to stomp all over it with a set heavy on crowd favorites and semi-obscurities. Many of these were presented in a special limited Halloween edition, including “Jenny,” which, for one night only, went “hi-diddle-dee-dee, Bat-Man, it’s a pirate’s life for me.” And Peter Hughes committed to his zombie role, replacing his “YEAH!” backing vocals with “URRGH!” when appropriate. It often was.
The revelation of the night for me, though, was Franklin Bruno, of Nothing Painted Blue, the Extra Glenns, and sometimes The Believer. I described his contributions as “embellishments” above. That was incorrect. They were illuminations, like the kind you find on medieval manuscripts, you dig me? I’m all about the minimalism, as you all well know, but Bruno’s barroom piano on “Dance Music” was one of about a dozen perfect moments in the night. I might have gotten a little carried away in Brunadoration, and I might have told him he was a god among men after the show.
I know I pretty much stay in hyperbole mode when it comes to writing about music here, but really: this was one of the two or three greatest live experiences I’ve had, and maybe the most fun, period. Encore-style singalongs began happening somewhere about halfway through the main set and didn’t much let up, though they never got annoying, because remember: this was a happening. Here’s the setlist as best I remember it; the main set isn’t in any particular order between the opener and closer:
Love Love Love
Jenny
Wild Sage
New Monster Avenue
Oceanographer’s Choice (aborted when the band couldn’t remember how to play it)
The Mess Inside
Dance Music
Lion’s Jaw
Houseguest
Grendel’s Mother
Going to Georgia
Alpha Incipiens
Baboon
See America Right (“This is a song about the love two alcoholics have for one another. Some of you know what I’m talking about. Some of you will.”)
Terror Song
Encore:
No Children
This Year
Watch for updates with new pictures.
And finally, a Batgirl’s work is never done:
UPDATES
Plenty more pictures here!
MORE UPDATES!
MORE MOUNTAIN GOATS ON PRETTY FAKES:
On “Heretic Pride” and Heretic Pride
Review: The Sunset Tree (“Darnielle on the Edge of Town”)
On “Sax Rohmer #1”
Review: Get Lonely
PF’s (already multiply revised) Mountain Goats Top 10
Mountain Goats in Baton Rouge: April 2005
Gorjus’ MG show poster
Gorjus: “Sub-Par in the ‘90s (‘You and Your Memory’)”
WOOOOOOOOOOO
Greatest. Post. EVAR. I am wallowing in stagnant and possibly fermented regret. The look on Mssr. Darnielle’s face . . . how cool. This must have been so cool.
Please tell me “Going to Georgia” was a rumpshaker, and PLEASE tell me how awesome “This Year” was. That’s my favorite song. Oh, I’m kicking myself.
And the photo of Contessa is hilarious!!
Update:
Prof.!! I love the aborted “Oceanographer’s Choice/Jenny,” and I know that’s you 44 seconds in screaming “NOOOOOO!” when St. John says he can’t remember the song anymore . . . ‘fess up!!
alright professor, you’ve set the stage – conversely and i will be braced for the goats’ antics next wednesday here in columbia, and now, i imagine we’ll both have to write it up for you in return. i hate set lists…i can never remember track names – but i’ll do my best for the posterity of our internet community.
as for peter, remind me to share a story from the last time i saw TMG in charleston in the fall of 04 some time – suffice it to say we had a conversation, and he used the word ‘overzealous’ in a sentence while trying to sell us john vanderslice t-shirts out of the trunk of his impala.
oh wait – i guess i mostly just shared the story.
until a later date, thanks for the post, and best of luck to you and yours.
also: why no posts on the paterson project blog? hast thou forsaken us?
aw, man. I missed another good show. gol-darnit. damn research project. Great post, though. It almost makes me feel like I was there.
T, no! I haven’t forsaken you—I just haven’t been up to offering the intelligent commentary the project clearly demands (nor have I listened to the songs yet…)
Prof:
No worries about intelligent commentary – we respond well to everything. the other day, someone posted asking for a latte, and we replied: what size? and where are you?
the songs are fun – give’em a listen when you get a chance. as for the ‘p fakes,’ as i call it: i’ll keep reading.
thanks for the discourse,
Schwitters