This defiant wilfulness pervades through the luscious bubbles of piano and strum that fanfare Darnielle’s chest-thumping professions of being “so proud to be alive” before culminating in ‘Craters On The Moon’’s tumultuous, violin-riddled storm. Opener 'Sax Rohmer #1'’s country-strewn charm immediately ushers attentive ears down a rediscovered pathway of positivism zipping and bulging to abrupt acoustic stutters and a vivid, colourful narrative that, although enveloped in intrepid defeatism, rouses euphorically with our unshackled protagonist decreeing “I am coming home to you if it’s the last thing that I do” so compulsively you begin to fear for the hinges of your front door.
That’s by no means a slight on Get Lonely’s tenderly crafted soundscapes – a timid but nonetheless resplendent album steeped in a hushed sensibility that could moisten the tear-ducts of even the most stony-faced cynic – but each of the 13 tracks here are fuller in both sound and scope, plying the affections with an urgency more attune to 2005’s glistening, full-bodied goblet The Sunset Tree. And in the release of new record Heretic Pride we find this Indiana-born trouveur extending the myopic throes of his last full-length offering in the hope of enticing a few more unwitting victims into his welcoming clutches.
But his strength rests not only in voice Darnielle is a masterful rhythmic contortionist whose spiderous deft of touch lures unassuming mindsets into a webbed lair decorated with bushy-tailed jaunts before entangling his helpless prey in a harrowing cocoon of introspective soul-bearing. Yet despite such distinguished voice-box croaking, the return of John Darnielle whets whistles with a veracity more intense than any of the aforementioned crooners and croonettes could ever muster.Īn extraordinary fusion of crowing dramatics and tender Jim Henson-esque purity, his corrosive shrill evokes and represses, refutes and unites, teeters and transcends – all in one swoosh of those withered, swash-buckling vocal-chords. From the elasticated regalia of Zachery Condon’s nomadic warble, Amy Winehouse’s smoke-ingested jazz-bar purrs, and onwards to Allen, Nash and Peñate’s urbanite colloquialisms, it’s been a period conspicuous in its cradling of proud, prominent tonality.
The 18 months following The Mountain Goats’ last long-playing release Get Lonely have seen a multitude of vocal strains rise to prominence – some welcomed, some less wilfully embraced and some just darn right despised.