Previously unreleased Tiny Desk Concert by The Mountain Goats
April 10, 2020 5:05 PM   Subscribe

A Tiny Desk Concert by The Mountain Goats recorded a decade ago it should be noted that Darnielle drew a large and admiring crowd for this show, even though it appears in the video that it was attended exclusively by a photographer and the giant blond head of Lars Gotrich. Trust me: We wouldn't have missed this one for anything.

Set List
"Color in Your Cheeks"
"Hebrews 11:40"
"Psalms 40:2"
"Going to Georgia"

Bonus: Laura Jane Grace's cover of Going to Georgia

Rhi Carter's Ska cover
posted by mecran01 (26 comments total) 26 users marked this as a favorite
 
Meanwhile, John Darnielle just released their first Boombox recorded tape since 2002. Since he was stuck at home and discovered he could make the Panasonic work again by setting it on its side.
posted by selfnoise at 5:23 PM on April 10, 2020 [20 favorites]


Is this the thread where I get to complain that I got a text about their new cassette release this morning and it sold out in the time it took me to blearily read it in bed, wake up fully, and find my credit card? šŸ˜¢
posted by btfreek at 5:23 PM on April 10, 2020 [4 favorites]


There's another batch on sale tomorrow.
posted by Candleman at 5:48 PM on April 10, 2020 [5 favorites]


Iā€™ve listened to ā€œGoing to Georgiaā€ easily hundreds of times, and every cover Iā€™ve ever come across, and I have never, not once, gotten Darnielleā€™s own interpretation from it. I wish he still performed it.
posted by Etrigan at 6:06 PM on April 10, 2020


Eek I just listened to Going to Georgia and Color in Your Cheeks super recently. The Mountain Goats are excellent walk-around-the-block-again company! (I downloaded the new album but was nowhere near on time to get a tape.)
posted by ferret branca at 6:28 PM on April 10, 2020


*smug* I got in my order for the tape. (The resurrection of the boombox feels like some form of divine intervention.)

This TDC isn't actually "unreleased"--I've watched it many times (perhaps someone posted it illicitly)--but it's nice to revisit. He does a chord change (I think) in the third verse of "Color in Your Cheeks" that's not on the album version nor on any other live version I've heard. In all seriousness, they can play that version at my memorial service, it's perfect for that even if it's not even in my top ten MGs songs.
posted by praemunire at 6:36 PM on April 10, 2020 [3 favorites]


I love following him on Twitter because he loves magic: the gathering so we get to talk about it. It's very enjoyable.
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 6:56 PM on April 10, 2020 [2 favorites]


*happy sigh*

What a lovely version of Color In Your Cheeks. AND a new album!?
posted by jameaterblues at 6:58 PM on April 10, 2020


I like the TDC so thanks for this! I am mildly confused that the post is for the decade old live video and not the brand new boombox album. But Mountain Goats content is good content either way.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:13 PM on April 10, 2020 [2 favorites]


I was mildly stressed out when a payment error lost me my first tape on the Merge website this morning, but I caught the second text for the Bandcamp release a couple hours later and everything is fine and dandy. All Goats is good Goats.
posted by redsparkler at 7:21 PM on April 10, 2020


add to favorites

Yes.
posted by gwint at 7:38 PM on April 10, 2020


I am also very excited that i grabbed a tape!!!

Saw him in July for the first time in a decade and Song for My Stepfather really, really wrecked me.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 10:30 PM on April 10, 2020


From their instagram:
OK, when I said we were gonna do a new tape, I thought, who will buy a tape when it is available digitally, maybe 500 people? A thousand, maybe weā€™ll make a thousand and whatever doesnā€™t sell we will take out on tour, when we get to tour again. I am humbled and awed by the response to our tape. We are doing a third edition, this one of 2000 in a silver shell, to make sure nobody has to pay scalper prices just to have a tape. When we do get back out on the road, I expect weā€™ll have whatever is left from this third and final run at the merch table. From the very bottom of our hearts, thank you for making this Good Friday a day of wonder and gratitude for us -- you have made it easier for our whole crew to bear this uncertain time. Honor and glory to you all!! Third and final pressing of 2,000 available tomorrow on @bandcamp at 3pm EST at the link in bio.
I find it strange that John didn't think the first pressing would sell out. His reaction that seems to be "Okay, I was wrong about that, and the second run, but the *third* run couldn't possibly sell out too."

We will find out tomorrow, but I believe he is badly mistaken about this. People want a physical totem of the music, and if a cassette is all that is available, then a cassette is what they will get. You'd see different sales numbers on the cassette if a CD or vinyl was available alongside it.

Which is to say, I got one of the first pressing.
posted by vibratory manner of working at 1:27 AM on April 11, 2020 [5 favorites]


I came late to the Mountain Goats, but I know Iā€™ve seen this video somewhere. In fact, it was this version of Color in your Cheeks I heard first that sent me looking for the album that had it. Great, great song, one of my favorites.
posted by Ghidorah at 3:49 AM on April 11, 2020 [1 favorite]


haha wow i have not watched a lot of live mountain goats footage, that was intense. i love this band but their whole aesthetic is aggressively unsexy, and it's hilarious to watch. it's probably part of the appeal.
posted by mammal at 11:25 AM on April 11, 2020 [1 favorite]


I dunno, I think Peter Hughes has a classic bassist charisma.

The third pressing is on sale RIGHT NOW, if you forgot!
posted by praemunire at 12:10 PM on April 11, 2020 [2 favorites]


...and sold out in something like 10 minutes. Lol.

It's a good album.
posted by vibratory manner of working at 12:32 PM on April 11, 2020 [1 favorite]


I always have to follow this video (which has definitely been unofficially available for years) up with this amazing live full-band showcase of Psalms 40:2.
posted by atoxyl at 12:44 PM on April 11, 2020 [2 favorites]


Metafilter dredged up a post about All Eternals Deck from 2011 for me in the related posts field, and I found it to be interesting to visit in the current context.

On the one hand, I think we have, as a fan base, become more accepting of how John has moved past his early days, and the kind of music he mostly wants to make now.

On the other, I want to let all the people pining for more Early Mountain Goats in that thread: Here it is! Nine years later, but you got your wish!

Which isn't *quite* true. Even with the same tools and methods, he's a different musician now than he was then; he's more technically accomplished at playing the guitar, and I think he's developed a kind of delicacy for some some songs that is different than anything in the early catalog. Of the new ones, Exegetic Chains is a great piece that's a thematic capstone which links the pagan/christian themes of the album with the throwback methods he's using to make the songs. It's also musically more in line with the recent stuff, I think, Panasonic hum or no.
posted by vibratory manner of working at 1:01 PM on April 11, 2020 [2 favorites]


Even with the same tools and methods, he's a different musician now than he was then

I saw them live this autumn and when someone called out for Going to Georgia, John took his hands off his guitar strings and said that isn't a song he plays anymore, because it's about a very immature person being a real asshole for no good reason. Then he played something better, off Goths.

Really looking forward to hearing new Goats sound in old Goats format. Took me all 3 pressings to get through, but I was finally able to order my copy today.
posted by EatTheWeek at 1:21 PM on April 11, 2020 [2 favorites]


I can't find my copy of the AED tape since I moved, which is annoying.
posted by praemunire at 1:52 PM on April 11, 2020 [1 favorite]


I have the impression that John Darnielle has grown and healed in various ways over the years, and that some of the music he made when he was younger just no longer resonates with him. Not just Going to Georgia, but other songs as well. Here's his take on Chanson du Bon Chose, nearly twenty years after the fact:
"Occasionally if you're me, you go back and listen to some songs that, um, that you say, 'whoa, what was going on with me at that time?' I don't mean the ones that are actually like, you know, when I'm talking about my life, like 'Dance Music,' things like that, I know both of those stories, those are true stories. This song is a story, but we went through it in soundcheck -- wow, what was going on with you, dark little fellow? I mean, I remember, I was in college, things were generally pretty okay. Something festering in there somewhere. This is a song about festering."
It's genuinely great that he's in a better place now, but I can't help but feel a loss regarding it, because his work between 1994-2004 is some of my favorite music ever, and his newer stuff just does nothing for me. I'm glad he got the Panasonic working again, though.
posted by dephlogisticated at 3:11 PM on April 11, 2020 [3 favorites]


Even with the same tools and methods, he's a different musician now than he was then; he's more technically accomplished at playing the guitar, and I think he's developed a kind of delicacy for some some songs that is different than anything in the early catalog.

I think some of the best Mountain Goats there is is the solo acoustic renditions of newer songs - Darnielle is a more accomplished songwriter now than he was in 1993 (maybe not than he was in 2003) but as great as his band is some of the material still shines best in the old raw style.
posted by atoxyl at 10:52 PM on April 11, 2020 [1 favorite]


I saw them live this autumn and when someone called out for Going to Georgia, John took his hands off his guitar strings and said that isn't a song he plays anymore, because it's about a very immature person being a real asshole for no good reason.

I always thought it was a more ambiguous song than he seems to think but it's his song.
posted by atoxyl at 10:54 PM on April 11, 2020 [3 favorites]


I was surprised too! But yeah, reckon he knows more about the circumstances of its genesis than anyone. Later in the night, he broke out Best Ever Death Metal Band Out of Denton from what he said was basically cold storage. So not all of the old stuff has been tossed.
posted by EatTheWeek at 12:30 PM on April 13, 2020


It's definitely only that one and maybe a couple early ones that nobody would ask him to play anyway. Even though this tape is likely prompted by the pandemic and tour cancellation he's definitely been in a bit of a nostalgic frame of mind. He did a run of three solo shows in SF (and I believe was planning to do some in other places before they had to be postponed) of which I got to see the last and it was a great mix of stuff from the whole Goats career. Apparently on the first night he actually played "Golden Boy." And the second was entirely "un(officially)released" songs (which honestly would have been too much of a hardcore fan thing for me so I'm glad I went to the one I went to).
posted by atoxyl at 1:06 PM on April 13, 2020 [1 favorite]


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