For One Week Only: The Life Of The World To Come

While The Mountain Goats’ amazing 2005 album, The Sunset Tree, would sit in any list I’d make of my favourite records of all time, I have to say I was a little unmoved by last year’s excursion into Biblically-inspired songwriting, The Life Of The World To Come. But having spent the morning watching Rian Johnson’s amazing documentary/concert movie of John Darnielle performing the album song by song I now wonder whether I’ve failed to hear what’s really there. Either way, I don’t think there’s any doubting the beauty and intensity that’s captured in Johnson’s film; certainly all the qualities of fragility and tenderness that make The Mountain Goats’ best songs so powerful are on display, but stripped back to their essence.

If you’d like a taste of the film, I’ve embedded a couple of tracks below, and if you like what you hear you can watch the whole thing over at Pitchfork TV. The only catch is it’s only available for a week, so it won’t be around for long. So I suggest you take a listen while you can: it’s wonderful stuff.

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