Another Form of Relief

The Mountain Goats intimidate me. Not in the literal sense of course, but rather that I find their back cataog to be far too large. I only discovered them a couple of years ago when ‘The Sunset Tree’ was doing the rounds. Since then, I’ve explored them a little, but their output is simply too prolific for me to be able to get through all of it without rushing through it, which would probably result in me failing to form any connection with most of it. It’s a vicious cycle. So far I’ve explored most of the newer, less lo-fi content, but the thought of heading back further is daunting.

Occasionally I use the Live Music Archive as a way of looking through recent shows, listening to both the songs I know and the ones I don’t as a way of becoming more familiar with old “favourites”. There’s never a shortage of cotent to explore with nearly 50 complete Mountain Goats shows in the archive. Looking around recently though I noticed that the band are perfoming their cover version of ‘The Boys Are Back In Town Again’. I know they played this on a French radio session once and have a rip of it, but thought I’d listen to how they play it now.

The first thing I noticed is that the song was listed as “with Pony Up!”, which was a surprise to me as I didn’t even know they were touring together though. It’s certainly an interesting combination, and enjoying both bands, I couldn’t resist giving it a listen. The most surprising aspect was that it’s the polar opposite to the previous version I’d heard, with this one being upbeat and quite rocking. This is something of a contrast to the slowed down, mildly creepy version that I’d heard previously.

Now Pony Up! add little to this beyond backing vocals on the chorus, but it gives the song a little extra depth, and everyone sounds like they are having a fun time with it. Of course, John can’t resist bursting into a quick rendition of R Kelly’s ‘Ignition Remix’ before the song is over, which seems to now be standard.

MP3 The Mountain Goats & Pony Up! - The Boys Are Back In Town (live) (expired)

Boring details: The quality isn’t particularly great, but most live recordings tend to be like that. It’s certainly more than listenable though. If you’re interested in the little details, this was recorded at the Independent in San Francisco on 8 March 2007. You can listen to the entire show that it was recorded from here.

The Mountain Goats: Website
Pony Up!: Website || Myspace

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