Whatever your religious beliefs, the Bible is a rich, resonant and remarkable piece of literature and a source of material not lost on musicians, like Peter Gabriel and Bob Dylan, who mined Old Testament tales long before he converted to Christianity in the late ’70s. Mountain Goats, a quaint folk group, breathes further life into the fire-and-brimstone tales of the Bible in “The Life of the World to Come,” an album immersed in biblical imagery.
Each song is named for a bible passage, with some lyrics culled directly from biblical texts. What saves “The Life of the World to Come” from being a simple recital is John Darnielle’s ability to mesh ancient prose with modernized turns of phrase, like his references to self-help tapes, a Red Roof Inn or chemotherapy.
Opener “1 Samuel 15:23” is spare folk, with minor-key acoustic guitar and muted drums. “My house will be for all people who have nowhere to go,” Darnielle sings. “Psalms 40:2” is desperate and neurotic, with Darnielle’s voice quavering and bleating and the drums hitting hard.
The meat of the album begins with “Genesis 3:23,” a jangly, relatively secular tune stretched over a warm organ figure, and the similar “Philippians 3:20-21.” In the latter, Darnielle’s humanizes the words of the Bible, singing about someone who “has gone home to God now/ Safe in his arms.” The vibrant earthiness of “Hebrews 11:40” is stunning, with trilling strings and delicately brushed drums. Darnielle’s subtle vocal inflections are beautifully restrained.
The sustained piano quarter notes that introduce “Genesis 30:3” might remind the listener of a dramatic technique employed by Death Cab for Cutie, but Darnielle’s rushed, semi-spoken singing is quite different from Ben Gibbard’s. In “Romans 10:9,” Mountain Goats take some liberties with the original passage, changing “mouth” to “lips,” singing, “If you believe in your heart/ And confess with your lips/ Surely you will be saved one day.”
“Matthew 25:21” finds the narrator flying “in from Pennsylvania” to visit a loved one dying of cancer. “Tried to brace myself/ You can’t brace yourself/ When the time comes,” sings Darnielle. “I am a witness to your life and to its worth,” he sings, not to Jesus, but to the dying loved one. “It’s three days later when I get the call/ And there’s nobody around to break my fall.”
Rating: W W W W
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