All Hail West Texas

Not the Mountain Goats album I'd have added to the list, but they're always so good.

This was alright, but it could have been so much better. I'm not opposed to a DIY/home recording approach (Nebraska by Bruce Springsteen is one of my favorite albums) but this didn't work that well for me. It just comes across as being slightly pretentious and overly clever. Still giving it 3 stars, because at the core the songs are solid.

Lest any geographically challenged people mock me for this review, the song doesn't match the title! Denton is north Texas, not west. Unless there's a north Denton in west Texas in the similar way that north Bend is no where geographically close to Bend, OR. Jenny sounds like Jesse's girl.

The first three tracks are an absolute home run. Quirky clever low-fi storytelling. Though it sounds like it was recording on a cassette tape, it has charm. Unfortunately the success of this is based on whether the remaining songs can continue to capture your interest... and they start to fizzle a bit. The music doesn't seem to be the star... it is just there as background to carry along the storytelling, and though there are some interesting bits here and there, it is definitely starts to blend together. Interesting find.

Rating: 6/10

One of the roughest albums I've ever heard. Cursory research has revealed that the album was recorded directly into a cassette boom box, and I can't fathom why. The songs seem to do a lot of meandering in the lyrics. Mildly curious to listen to one of the albums with a full band instead of one man and a boom box.

5 4

I'm bored out of my mind, how can they classify this as Rock on the record? Even their best tracks don't work for me...next.

One of the songs stole a vocal melody from a NOFX song, but it was fleeting and mostly I just hated this. Lame Americana themes, vibe calls to brisket festivals and big moustaches/belt buckles - ironically, of course. And no doubt most of these guys' fans would shudder at those darkthrone albums recorded using a similar attention to detail RE equipment. 2/5.

Lo-fi does not seem to be something I like

Hail Satan

One of the best albums from one of my favorite outfits ever. One of my more memorable concert experiences. Even chatted with John after the show. I think I'd have gone with Sunset Tree, but this is still perfection.

I'm all about Mr. John Darnielle, going way back to the mid 90s - though with the common caveat that I'm not that cool, this is another one I was introduced to by my brother. Saw him perform in a tiny bar venue in Uptown Minneapolis around '95, '96 (with Rachel Ware on bass) and just a couple years ago with the band, packing the First Avenue mainroom with an impressively cross-generational crowd from Z to X and probably a few Boomers in the mix. The home recording on the early stuff has its charms though it is ultimately limited, and as a musician at that point his playing served its purpose but was nothing to write essays about, but as a lyricist in the modern idiom he has few peers in my opinion.

One of my indie marks of shame growing up was that I went to college in Denton, Texas, yet never truly listened to The Mountain Goats (and missed out on many hometown shows) out of a fear that I never "got" their music. Coming back a decade later, I understand why the younger version of myself struggled – this is a narrative LP through and through, the only things guiding the listener through a threadbare acoustic and Darnielle's monotone storytelling. Maybe it's my age, maybe it's the fact I left my home state behind a long time ago, but listening back to these intimate corners of life set in familiar locales finally hit home. The consistent minimal lo-fi instrumentation does threaten to wear a bit thin in the middle, but the genuine nature and slightly sardonic lens we're given to look through at these human situations carries the LP enough to make it to the finish line. This is the highest I've rated a singer-songwriter LP by far (it's one of my least favorite genres instrumentally), and I'm definitely giving this bonus cred due to my Texas pride, but I cannot deny how well-composed and real this album feels.