All My CDs, pt 87: The Sunset Tree

The Sunset Tree - The Mountain Goats

I got this album after hearing Dilaudid on my Pandora station. There aren’t a lot of examples of such immediate love-at-first-sight with regards to a particular song, and it’s hard for my to explain why this one hit me so hard and fast.

The Sunset Tree is a concept album about domestic abuse (this should be clear, if not from the music itself, then from the dedication which includes explicit words of encouragement to victims of abuse). But something occurred to me this morning as I cracked it open with my analytical eyes open: as clearly and unambiguously as each song’s lyrics address the issues of violence within families, they never do so directly. Each time the narrative begins to show a little bit of its primary subject, the line of sight is shunted aside to some metaphor or literary allusion. We’re never allowed to look the violence right in the eye and acknowledge it for what it is. Yet, each song manages to still say what it means, almost more impactfully because it uses a language of metaphor. It’s almost as if, when a topic is so viscerally fraught and horrifying, the only way to effectively speak of it (without scaring off the audience) is figuratively.

Many of the metaphors use animal imagery. Lions to represent the raw violence of a huge and powerful aggressor. Magpies to represent the theft of life and pleasure and joy. Others are biblical: at the end of This Year, when the stepfather is coming down the driveway, “There will be feasting / and dancing / in Jerusalem next year.”

For this and many other reasons I’m coming to the conclusion that John Darnielle may be one of the best songwriters of our time. Or perhaps he’s just adept at the peculiar melange of positive and negative imagery and sound that tickles my own senses so powerfully. Either way, I’m glad to be wrapping up shelf 2 of 3 with three Mountain Goats albums, and hope one day to increase that number.

Next: Tallahassee