The Mountain Goats

I'm going to try out something a little different on Fridays. That something is, well, anything other than reviews. This time, I'm going to talk about a band that troubles me.

I first heard about The Mountain Goats from Patrick of Beards, Etc. He gave such a glowing review of All Eternals Deck that I picked up the album. I couldn't make it through the first song. It was just way too indie rock for me, and I couldn't stand it.

But I've come to realize frontman John Darnielle is sort of a nexus between my musical interests and some of my comedic interests. I'll go into those some other time, but what's important here is the man has metal cred. He writes a regular column in Decibel. He declared Mercyful Fate "a top 5 band" for him, and I'll forgive him for not saying "a top 1 band" because of his tattoos. He said that when they do his autopsy, they'll find out how much he loved Mercyful Fate.

This guy has Mercyful Fate tattoos?

I had the opportunity to hear some live performances by him on a comedy podcast, and he played this absolutely incredible song, "Lovecraft in Brooklyn."



The live version was even better than the studio. He sounded more intense, more unhinged. It convinced me to pick up All Eternals Deck again and give it a proper chance. Long story short, I kind of like it, once I got past the vocal style. Just kind of. Some of it is just boring, but there are some songs that are great.



I don't know what I'm getting at here, if anything. It's just been on my mind a lot, and I picked up Heretic Pride as well. What do you think? Do you have any thoughts on the band, or other bands that you've struggled with like this? Have you ever listened to something several times out of morbid curiosity, and still couldn't make up your mind? Does this kind of indie rock make you want to stab yourself in the earhole?