The Mountain Goats @ Billboard, 10/12/2008

Six nights ago was the most amazing night of my life to date, so I thought I might tell you about it. The beauty of doing so on my own blog is that I can ramble and digress as much as I like, so beware!

I will refrain from expounding at great length on the ridiculously high regard in which I hold Mr John Darnielle¹ and his band, because that is a whole tl;dr post in itself.² Instead, I will content myself with saying that I looked forward to seeing the Mountain Goats live for the first time more than can possibly be healthy, and I thank my lucky stars that I happened to be in Melbourne on the night of this show.

After some deliciously tasty pre-show dumplings and a congenial queueing experience, we³ deposited ourselves at Billboards ridiculous crowd barrier⁴ and used ephant's crutches to repel boarders, or perhaps just to passively discourage people from kicking and shoving us out of the way.

The Support: Teeth and Tongue

Although Melbourne band Baseball were supposedly supporting The Mountain Goats all over the country, on this particular night the support act was Teeth and Tongue. Not a band I'd ever be likely to encounter of my own volition (which probably says more about my musical myopia than it does about Teeth and Tongue), but pretty entertaining once I got into frontwoman Jess Cornelius' performance and managed to ignore the looming threat of wardrobe malfunction.

A quick look around the internet tells me that Teeth and Tongue is essentially just Cornelius' project, so the bassist and drummer on the night could probably have been anybody. Regardless, they provided a tight and surprisingly sludgy backdrop for Cornelius' charismatic and accomplished performance. I guess I'm not allowed to refer to her guitar playing as "shredding", as that term is surely reserved for something far more specific, but it was excellent; likewise, her vocal strength and stage presence, although I think a little less shyness and a little more unapologetic awesomeness would work nicely between songs.

Although it was suggested to me that the good parts were "when she wasn't trying to be PJ Harvey", I think her performance drew on several girl-stereotype-defying influences without being too beholden to any of them. Certainly a welcome change from the airy, pouty sort of indie-pop songstresses that have kept me in the XY vocalists' camp for most of this year. Jess Cornelius' band could beat up your bands, ladies.⁵

All things considered, Teeth and Tongue did well to distract me from my impatience and the clock, let alone make music I actively enjoyed. B+, would see again.

The Main Event: The Mountain Goats

The wait after the support act would have been excruciating had I not been ridiculously excited. Nobody seemed to remember what time the Mountain Goats were supposed to start playing, and at least one time the tinned music stopped, only to start again and dash all our hopes. Then, just as I was resigning myself to another fifteen minutes of waiting - ridiculous, portentous synth-orchestral music boomed from the speakers, followed by an equally ridiculous, tinny latin cheese number which heralded the arrival of the gentlemen of the hour.

A quick aside is necessary to exclaim over the sartorial elegance on display: drummer Jon Wurster and bassist Peter Hughes⁶ in natty three-piece suits (have they not glands?), and John Darnielle in a tremendous jacket with all sorts of sewn-on patches, including what I suspect were individual letters spelling out "SARCOFAGO" on the back. Despite repeated exhortations to "take it off!" (stay classy, Melbourne), the jacket remained until its ceremonial removal at the beginning of the encore.

The show itself was, of course, amazing. I hadn't been looking at setlists for the Australian tour, or the Last Happy Night Of Your Life tour in the US, so I had very little idea of what we would be likely to get apart from "probably a fair few songs from Heretic Pride". True to form, the Mountain Goats delivered a delicious smorgasboard of the old and the new, without breaking (much of) a sweat.

From the main set: "Have to Explode" (the opener) was a pleasant surprise, as was "September 15th 1983"; "Black Pear Tree", "Wizard Buys A Hat" (Wizard Buys A Hat!!) and "Game Shows Touch Our Lives" made me delirious with happiness; a cover of Mary Chapin Carpenter's "Here I Am", a song previously unknown to me, has been responsible for a Youtube tab in my browser for the last couple of days. These were the highlights, but every other song would have been a highlight of anyone else's show. That is how good this band is.

John's introduction to "In the Craters of the Moon" went something like this (paraphrased):

You know, one day you're going to look in the mirror and you will be like, "Who has stolen my mirror?" And then you will open the cabinet behind the mirror, and you'll be like, "Who has stolen my medicine?" But it's not really medicine. But I know what it is, and that's why I wrote this song for you.

We were also treated to the stories behind "Thank You Mario But Our Princess Is In Another Castle" and "Wizard Buys A Hat", some discussion of the Radiohead Model of music release, and assorted other delights.

The only thing more awesome than John's ability to stand on stage and chat to the audience about anything, guaranteed an adoring reception, is the pure joy that he emanates on stage. I am firmly convinced that John Darnielle performing is the happiest thing in the world.⁷ (Given the karate kicks and jumping around, the word "adorkable" may also be appropriate.) . Maybe that's the secret of his success: anyone who can tap their (not inconsiderable) well of personal darkness in such a celebratory manner is sure to find devoted fans among any group of people who have ever embraced their emotions. Or simply had emotions.

Especially pleasing was the brief interlude when Wurster and Hughes went offstage, leaving John and his acoustic guitar to play us a few songs (and even take requests, although some members of the crowd could have stood to make fewer). While the entire set was brilliant, it was certainly Heretic Pride-flavoured as a result of having live drums as well as bass. Very energetic and super engaging, but having missed out on all the earlier Mountain Goats shows I was glad to have the opportunity to take in a few songs, as they say, kickin' it old school.

And despite my unholy love for Kaki King, I have to say that John doing "Black Pear Tree" solo and acoustic is the definitive version of that song for me. Oh my. I caught myself forgetting to breathe.

That said, some of the older songs are amazing in their updated, punchier form. Oh yes, "Game Shows Touch Our Lives", I'm looking at you.

This is where I admit that I can't remember which of "No Children" and "This Year" was in the main set, and which in the encore. Maybe they were even both in the main set? Yikes. Well, whenever they happened, they were the all-singalong all-awesome extravaganza that any Mountain Goats fan would expect. Yay. (I think it was "No Children" in the encore. I think.)

So, the encore! After the last parading of the maybe-Sarcofago jacket, John grabbed his microphone from its stand, left his guitar where it was, and proceeded to climb on foldbacks, point at members of the audience, serenade a security guy into a false sense of security before climbing on the crowd barrier and hugging certain lucky fans, and generally give a five-star rockstar performance of "Houseguest", a song which is apparently by another band of PPH's.

Rounding out the encore were "No Children" (I think. Erk.) and a blistering rendition of "Palmcorder Yajna" that absolutely and irrevocably made this the best night of my life.⁸ Holy cow, but I love that song. I read elsewhere that "I Love You. Let's Light Ourselves On Fire" was also in there, but I hesitate to include it because I have zero actual memory of that from the night. Possibly due to a surfeit of awesomeness that led my brain to shut down entirely, but also possibly because it didn't happen.

I was not especially impressed with the venue, or with the behaviour of a few undesirable elements in the crowd, but none of that could take anything away from the wonderful night I had. I was too happy to sleep until at least two in the morning. I am still happy. Maybe I always will be.

1. Henceforth to be referred to simply as John, because obviously we are on first name terms since I listen to his music so much [↩]
2. One which I may eventually make, but given the tremendous queue of things I would like to write about and the ease with which items jump that queue, breath-holding is inadvisable. [↩]
3. I say we, but my uncouth insistence on doing what I wanted may have swayed the popular vote [↩]
4. A barrier? For the Mountain Goats? Please. John described it on the night as "like every condom you've ever worn, all at once." [↩]
5. However, she is not allowed to beat up Kaki King. No, sir. [↩]
6. Henceforth referred to as PPH, because I saw the cool kids doing that once. [↩]
7. And I have felt compelled to tell people this many, many times this week. [↩]
8. Okay, it already was the best night of my life, but this made it even more best. [↩]