The hardest bands to review are those who have released wide discographies that span decades as well as those who have transformed over time making it nearly impossible to compare their early work with new releases. The Mountain Goats, however, posess both of these features. With nearly three-hundred songs under his belt and a career reaching back to his reggae days in college in the early nineties, as well as a stark contrast between the type and quality of music produced, any new release by John Darnielle is very hard to review and rate.
I like to break John down into two eras: the Panasonic Boombox era, and the studio era. Since Heretic Pride fits into the latter, its easiest to review it with albums like Tallahassee, The Sunset Tree, and Get Lonely in mind. The record opens with a Sax Rohmer #1 in which we see John pounding on the guitar and belting out his highly lyrical prose. After hearing this single I had such high hope for the new album that I actually knew I would be disappointed. And as I foretold I was, slightly.
The album begins to sound too predictable and because of how over-produced he is now it almost overshadows his lyrical genius. The record has no memorable lines, and something that Darnielle is great at doing is putting a phrase into our minds forever. It seems that John has completely shifted his focus onto his music rather than his lyrics which is very troubling for any true Mountain Goats fan. This album is far more listenable than the last release from Darnielle, Get Lonely, but The Sunset Tree still overpowers any of his other studio releases to this date. It seems that all Darnielle fans can hope for is his return to the old boombox recordings.
Rating: 5 Popsicles
[Since this is the first review I'll explain the rating system. The album will get from 1 to 10 popsicles, 10 being perfect and 1 being Icky Thump]
No comments:
Post a Comment