Present Joys

This was the first Mountain Goats bootleg I ever downloaded. I vividly remember listening to it and thinking, “hey, this band’s live stuff is mind-blowingly good; I think I will become obsessed.” This bootleg has got some really good renditions, viz. Tulsa Imperative, a rarity; pre-Heretic Pride versions of How to Embrace a Swamp Creature and In the Craters on the Moon; PPH-harmony-filled versions of Pure Milk and Tetrapod; and a Coroner’s Gambit where death’s “fingernails were glistening”. All in all, one of my favorite Mountain Goats bootlegs.

I’m attempting to add “release date” information into my iTunes library. That is, instead of just notating a “release year”, to also include month and day. It’s a big undertaking, and it’s surprisingly difficult to find release dates for a lot of albums before, say, 2005. I remembered this thread at the Mountain Goats forums where all the members put their heads together to make a list of release dates. They feed my OCD: just another reason why I love the tMG community.

This silent film is cool enough to watch on its own—it’s spooky and foreign and beautiful. Add to that the incredibly good Mountain Goats soundtrack and it’s even better. It builds and builds with the action of the film and complements it perfectly.