Music of Angels

To clarify the main reason I am writing this is to check how easy it is to manage the layout and format of this blog, so if you are a  reader looking for a review of The Mountain Goats new album this is possibly not the place for you, happen to like reading a collection of words written by a cat with little clue what he is doing then please read on.

Despite being a committed atheist I regularly download a religious podcast. It talks about various religious, philosophical and political stories, has interviews and handles itself in a semi-serious semi-comedic manor. It successfully combines irreverent humour with serious religious debates. One section which always sits at the end of the podcast is the 'Religious song of the Week', usually a traditional religious band or choir, occasionally someone from a religion such as the Zoroastrian faith. Once they had a Yiddish hardcore punk band. The latest podcast surprised me somewhat however, by having a folk artist I've been listening to a lot lately on as religious song of the week. That artist was The Mountain Goats.

Their new album The Life of the World To Come takes on a particularly strong religious theme, with track titles taking their name from the books and chapters of the bible. So how does the album compare to previous ones? Completely honestly not well. As fascinated as I am about religion the album doesn't deal with religion in a way that intrigues or interests me. Rather it focusses on ending, on death maybe. Unfortunately I found the tracks to be weak, boring and the album doesn't seem to even kick in until the final song 'Ezekiel 7 And the Permanent Efficacy of Grace'. A slow album potters on nicely in the background, nicely but boringly. Inoffensive and slow. It all seems like one long boring intro track to the final, emotional, powerful closure. 

All in all I can't help but be disappointed, I have 'The Sunset Tree' pretty much on permenant play at the moment, and whilst 'The Life of the World to Come' has some good moments, and deals with the inevitability of death well, it doesn't pack a punch that can be found in 'The Sunset Tree', 'All Hail West Texas' or 'Tallahassee'.