Okay, so there’s no dragons.
I just want to get that out of the way at the start.
When I first heard that The Mountain Goat‘s seventeenth (!) studio album would be a homage to Dungeons and Dragons, I was excited. Even though I haven’t played D&D in forever, I will always be a fan. And The Mountain Goats are one of my favorite bands.
But, I was concerned that this would be another “themed” album that was quickly forgotten. Over the last few years, the Mountain Goats have released a number of these albums that looked almost gimmicky. There was the “Metal” one (All Eternals Deck), the “Wrestling” one (Beat The Champ), and the religious one (The Life of The World To Come), among others.
Thankfully, In League With Dragons is unforgettable and far from a gimmick. It is the Mountain Goats best record in more than a decade. John Darnielle, the Mountain Goats brain, heart, and voice, has said in interviews that he started off wanting to write about wizards and rangers and fighters, but his imagination shifted and he imagined his usual cadre of broken people as heroes in their own right, not in some fantasy world, but in today’s world. And thus, the “theme” sorta went by the wayside and his extraordinary imagination went wild.
Album opener, “Done Bleeding”, is a perfect table setter, a powerful drum and bass performance setting the stage for whats to come. Second song and lead single, “Younger” is still the best song I’ve heard all year. Its’ driving, dramatic, core beat and melody are a departure from the band. They’re rarely this in your face. And when that horn shows up towards the back half of the song, it sets a fire in me that makes me think of the album cover.
“Paasiac 1975” reminds me of something off The Sunset Tree and its chorus of “I want everyone to get high” is something I think we can all get behind in 2019.
“Clemency for the Wizard King” seems like the one song on here that could be set in The Forgotten Realms. It’s a great story begging for some kind of animated video. Throughout the record, Darnelle’s song writing skills are at peak levels, perfectly capturing moods and characters like I haven’t seen him in years.
Title track, “In League with Dragons,” seems to be about a “protector” dragon coming to save a loner in a small town, complete with faintly country twang. (Okay, so maybe there is one dragon on the album.)
The fabulous back half of the album starts with “Doc Gooden”, a story of a late-career baseball player dealing with the end of his fame.
“Waylon Jennings Live!” is another highlight off an album full of excellence and stands out for its near-perfect imagery and alliteration, of a trunk “full of firearms and flash drives\ full of passports and international money orders \ for just in case I make it across the border.”
The bloody “Cadaver Sniffing Dog” is another unique song in the Mountain Goat’s epic discography. Electric guitar (!) and the best work from the rhythm section yet tells the story of first responders after a shooting or some kind of other disaster.
The eerie “An Antidote for Strychnine” has a ghostly vibe, sounding like it comes from an entirely different band.
Finally, the album ends with the uplifting “Sicilian Crest,” one of the largest songs they’ve done in a while. It feels almost like gospel, the band rising out of some of the dark corners they explored in the previous 11 songs to yearn for something brighter, something better.
Here’s the band performing “Sicilian Crest” on Colbert:
Overall, In League With Dragons is light on dragons, but heavy on feelings. It’s an ambitious collection of songs that highlight a band with a lot left to say and exploring new ways to say it. It is easily one of my favorite albums of 2019.
Elad Haber 