May 7 - Oceanographer's Choice

A driving bop, full of energy. Starts with stabbing Superman with a broadsword and goes up from there. This is full of energy, admittedly dark energy, and is a packed fantasia of fraught things happening to fraught people.

It's also... and even as I type this I'm not sure exactly how I mean this... it's also one of the most normal songs that I've heard from the Mountain Goats so far. Not in a negative sense. In more of a sense that this sounds like something that was professionally recorded in a studio environment with a full band who knew what they were doing. (and it was, and they did). Other than John's voice - which by now I would know across a tornado - there are less immediate tells that this is the Mountain Goats than in many of their songs.

I'm watching a band change and space appear for exciting things. It's okay to celebrate that and wave goodbye to some things at the same time.