In League With Dragons - The Mountain Goats: Review
The Mountain Goats
are a long running indie project based in North Carolina that is focused around singer-songwriter John Darnielle. They have over 25 years of history diving into numerous concepts and transitioning through different sounds and styles. In League With Dragons features a wide variety of personnel and was labelled by Darnielle as a "rock Opera" with influences from various literary sources.
Review By Lavender:
Despite the fact that I believe Darnielle is quite talented and that the band reps my home state of North Carolina I haven't been the biggest Mountain Goats fan. Most of their material in the 2010's struck me as creative, but not essential. There is almost always a baseline element of songwriting and there is almost never a drowning in influences or contemporary sounds and that is as true as ever here, but once again the band fails to make a significant mark on me.
The lead single for this album didn't thrill me straight away, and the context of the album as a whole hasn't helped. Cadaver Sniffing Dog sounds nothing like pretty much any other song on the album, it features a much more urgent song both lyrically and instrumentally. Unfortunately it has a total miss of a chorus that throws off the flow of the song and it never really recovers. The large majority of this album goes for a very different sound, patient but very dramatic, and occasionally it works.
Younger is a pretty solid track with some driving guitars and a great performance from John, the track may overstay its welcome a touch at 6 minutes long but overall it's a song I still enjoyed. Doc Gooden is a western inspired track with some unique strings that help it stand out and a half chorus that is actually pretty catchy. In the second half of this track he borrows the opening lyrics to LL Cool J's Momma Said Knock You Out which was one of the strangest but most hilarious moments on the project. Sicilian Crest is the closing track and a excellent blend of pretty much everything the album does right, its high energy and instrumental detail do a lot to leave the album on a positive moment that helps me feel like my time with it was more worthwhile.
Unfortunately not every time Darnielle sticks to his guns pays off. Done Bleeding is a super generic indie tune that features what is essentially a musical monologue that has some sweet singing and playing but is never catchy or memorable. Passaic 1975 has a painstakingly plain instrumental and while there is a lot to unfold in the lyrics listening to the track itself isn't nearly as worthwhile. The title track In League With Dragons is by far the biggest offender here and it becomes very hard to recount any element of this song even immediately after you've heard it, it's just that generic.
When Darnielle deviates from his usual style on this album the consistency gets a little better, but not by much. Clemency For The Wizard King is a decent track with some huge Kinks influence. The whispered vocals and constant change of pace makes the song feel longer than its under three minute runtime but it still manages to be a decent tune. Going Invisible 2 is a surprisingly compelling ballad with a killer vocal performance that matches really well with some of the furthest stripped back instrumentation on the entire album. An Antidote For Strychnine is yet another song that deviates from the norm but does so very well. It's a full 6 minutes long but given how lowkey the piano led song is the time it takes to develop is well worth it. The track is much more somber than pretty much anything else before and it ends up being quite compelling.
On the other side of the experimental coin are two tracks that don't work at all and are by far my least favorite. Possum By Night is a kooky piano ballad that I can only imagine appealing to big time Mountain Goats fans. It has weird songwriting and an even weirder performance from John Darnielle that is indulgent in a way that is just painfully grating, but it is nothing compared to Waylon Jennings Live. This track is quite literally a country song and an absolutely terrible one which is a shame because the lyrics are pretty good. Both the kooky and awful instrumental met with a strange fake southern accent from Darnielle make this track completely unbearable.
Unfortunately not every time Darnielle sticks to his guns pays off. Done Bleeding is a super generic indie tune that features what is essentially a musical monologue that has some sweet singing and playing but is never catchy or memorable. Passaic 1975 has a painstakingly plain instrumental and while there is a lot to unfold in the lyrics listening to the track itself isn't nearly as worthwhile. The title track In League With Dragons is by far the biggest offender here and it becomes very hard to recount any element of this song even immediately after you've heard it, it's just that generic.
When Darnielle deviates from his usual style on this album the consistency gets a little better, but not by much. Clemency For The Wizard King is a decent track with some huge Kinks influence. The whispered vocals and constant change of pace makes the song feel longer than its under three minute runtime but it still manages to be a decent tune. Going Invisible 2 is a surprisingly compelling ballad with a killer vocal performance that matches really well with some of the furthest stripped back instrumentation on the entire album. An Antidote For Strychnine is yet another song that deviates from the norm but does so very well. It's a full 6 minutes long but given how lowkey the piano led song is the time it takes to develop is well worth it. The track is much more somber than pretty much anything else before and it ends up being quite compelling.
On the other side of the experimental coin are two tracks that don't work at all and are by far my least favorite. Possum By Night is a kooky piano ballad that I can only imagine appealing to big time Mountain Goats fans. It has weird songwriting and an even weirder performance from John Darnielle that is indulgent in a way that is just painfully grating, but it is nothing compared to Waylon Jennings Live. This track is quite literally a country song and an absolutely terrible one which is a shame because the lyrics are pretty good. Both the kooky and awful instrumental met with a strange fake southern accent from Darnielle make this track completely unbearable.
This is far from an essential piece of The Mountain Goats discography and while I have both not been a longtime fan and had also not enjoyed the promotional single for this album I am not exactly surprised by where the quality is. The album is a touch inconsistent but even in its brightest moments I am not particularly impressed with this album, given that previous Mountain Goats works have impressed me much more with their concepts and songwriting. But I will be the first to admit I'm still waiting for whatever Darnielle does next. 5.5/10
Best Track: Sicilian Crest
For more indie check out my review of Foxygen's Seeing Other People here.
