John Darnielle, the songwriter behind the Mountain Goats, has a devoted fanbase. During his recent performance at Wolf Trap, there were frequent calls of “I love you, John.” This love for John comes down to a couple of things: First, he is one of the best songwriters working today, and, second, his unabashed passion for off-the-beaten track subject matter, like professional wrestling (Beat The Champ) and fantasy role-playing games (In League With Dragons), connects with people who may not often see themselves and their interests represented in popular song.
This Wolf Trap show perfectly complemented the Mountain Goat by pairing them with the New Ponographers and Margaret Glaspy on August 4. All of them play a cerebral brand of rock n’ roll — in the case of the Pornographers and the Goats, sometimes cryptic — that also features distinct sounds: Glaspy mixes introspective lyrics with a stripped-down, hard-rocking power trio; the New Pornographers constructing a wall of sound for a modern day take on power-pop; and the Mountain Goats, which featured Matt Hughes on a saxophone on a number of songs, somewhere in the vicinity of roots rock (one of their finest albums, The Sunset, has been described as a Southern California-based response or take on John Mellencamp’s Scarecrow).
It was blazing hot when Margaret Glaspy took the stage at 7 o’clock; I made it through more than one bottle of water during her 30-minute opening set. This is the fourth time I’ve seen her (opening for Neko Case in the before times, Spoon since, and once on her own), and she’s impressed me on each occasion. Her set was heavy on songs from latest album, last year’s critically acclaimed Echo The Diamond, beginning with the record’s lead-off track, “Act Natural,” followed by “Irish Goodbye,” “Memories,” “Female Brain,” and “Parental Guidance.” She rounded out her set with the title cut of her 2016 debut LP, “Emotions and Math,” and “Get Back.”
Watch the official music video for “Get Back” by Margaret Glaspy on YouTube:
Canadian indie rock supergroup The New Pornographers, led by AC Newman was up next, after a short intermission, and they got things started with the title track of 2014’s Brill Bruisers, followed by the “Laws Have Changed,” a highlight of their second album, 2003’s Electric Version. “Falling Down the Stairs of Your Smile” is a somewhat more recent song, from 2019’s In The Morse Code of Break Lights. After “Really, Really Light” (co-written with Dan Bejar, also known as Destroyer) the first song in the set from their most recent album, last year’s Continue as a Guest , Newman addressed the audience, telling them about the first time he saw the Mountain Goats, 25 years ago, playing with The Apples In The Stereo in front of 20 people. At the time, Carl thought, “I’m glad that the Mountain Goats guy is still at it.” That they’re still around, 25 years later, and bigger and more successful than ever, he said, is proof of the statement (made by Martin Luther King, Jr.) that “the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
Next up was “Use it,” from 2005’s Twin Cinema; the set also included two more songs from that album, “The Jessica Numbers,” and “The Bleeding Heart Show,” which concluded the set. “Cat and Mouse and With the Light,” is another track from Continue as a Guest; later in the set, they played the title track, Other songs included the title tracks from their first album, Mass Romantic, and Whiteout Conditions, “Angelcover,” “Sweet Talk, Sweet Talk,” “Adventures in Solitude,” “Champions of Red Wine,” “Last and Beautiful,” and “Testament to Youth In Verse.”
Watch The New Pornographers perform “Continue as a Guest” live for The Current on YouTube:
The New Pornographers finished up at 9pm, and, 30 minutes later, the Mountain Goats took the stage, walking out to Mary Chapin Carpenter’s cover of Lucinda Williams’s “Passionate Kisses.” (In a remarkable coincidence, I was wearing my Lucinda Williams t-shirt.) They began their set with “The Legend of Chavo Guerrero,” a song about the professional wrestler who was John’s childhood hero. The set continued with “Same as Cash” from last year’s Jenny From Thebes, a song cycle based around a character who originally appeared on 2002’s All Hail West Texas.
John Darnielle is an incredibly prolific songwriter; since the start of the Covid pandemic, he’s released five albums. One of those is Bleed Out, a collection of songs inspired by ’70s and ’80s thriller movies. “This is a song about how I, John, have guys on every corner,” he said, introducing the appropriately titled “Guys on Every Corner.” “Extraction Point,” he said, is “a song about a hostage a hostage situation. Are they really hostages if they’re not going to make it?”
John has a rather wry sense of humor. The next song, “Water Tower,” he said, “has four dead bodies. I didn’t plan it that way.” It also has, he noted, a dead body floating in a water tower — hence, the title of the song. “Fresh Tattoo,” another song from Jenny Thebes, followed, then most of the band left the stage, leaving John and his longest-serving bandmate, Peter Hughes. Calling back to Newman’s memory of seeing John at a tiny show, John mentioned how much he appreciates getting to play a venue like Wolf Trap, because, for a long time, the shows weren’t nearly at this size. John and Peter played one of his early songs, “Linda Blair Was Born Innocent.”
Peter left the stage, and it was just John on his guitar for a couple of songs: the early “Itzcuintli-Totzli Days,” and the more recent “You Were Cool,” a reflection on someone he knew back in his high school days in Southern California. The band came back, and the set continued with “The Diaz Brothers,” which John prefaced by saying, “I want you to be filled with dread.” Good news John: I have chronic anxiety, so it doesn’t take much.
After “Abandoned Flesh,” “Bell Swamp Connection,” and “Sicilian Crest,” the set took an unexpected turn. John talked about how, in 2001, he was driving in Iowa, and a song came on the radio that he did not like, so he turned it up: LeAnn Womack’s “I Hope You Dance,” the ubiquitous, inescapable pop-country hit of the time. (I prefer Womack’s later, more Americana-tinged work.) The band played the song, and then transitioned into its most popular song, the divorce shanty “No Children.” The set concluded with longtime favorite “This Year,” a song about resilience from the Sunset Tree, which is dedicated to his late, physically abusive stepfather. The audience sang along and danced in the aisles.
Watch The Mountain Goats perform “No Children” live for Jordan Lake Sessions on YouTube:
When the band came back for their encore, they played “Up The Wolves,” another cut from The Sunset Tree, followed by “Heel Turn 2,” from Beat The Champ, and “Spent Gladiator 2” to finish off a long night of great music. This was the second time I’ve seen the New Pornographers and the Mountain Goats, and the first time I’ve seen the Mountain Goats as a full band. John’s songs are excellent in any setting, but they really do benefit from a full sound — from Isa Burke’s guitar work, Jon Wurster’s drumming, and Peter’s bass. (He Matt Hughes, who is unrelated to Peter, at least as far as I know, accompanied John on the previous occasion when I saw them at the Birchmere.) They’re worth seeing in any configuration, but there’s nothing like a great band with great songs rocking out.
Here are some photos of Margaret Glaspy performing at Wolf Trap on August 4, 2024. All pictures copyright and courtesy of David LaMason.
Here are some photos of The New Pornographers performing at Wolf Trap on August 4, 2024. All pictures again copyright and courtesy of David LaMason.
And here are some photos of The Mountain Goats performing at Wolf Trap on August 4, 2024. All pictures again copyright and courtesy of David LaMason.
