The Justice

It's unfortunate how apt the title Heretic Pride is for the newest album from the Mountain Goats. Considering the almost religious following songwriter John Darnielle and his ever-expanding collective of collaborators have gathered over the past two decades, the title seems more a joke than an actual attempt at an enticement or description. With this release-the fifth since the Goats leapt into the studio six years ago-Darnielle has ventured even farther from his lo-fi origins and produced a collection of uninspired and forgettable songs marred by an overindulgent production style that compromises more than it enhances.

Prior to 2002, the Mountain Goats' material was recorded almost entirely on a Panasonic boom-box, with just Darnielle, his frenzied guitar playing and a seemingly never-ending supply of engrossing melodies, impassioned deliveries and lyrics that have earned him a position as poet laureate of the indie genre. Like Dylan with the Stratocaster, Darnielle's decision to drop the boom box for the control room remains controversial among fans. Yet where Dylan's transformation amplified his poeticism along with his guitar, the Mountain Goats' production only burdens the natural intensity of Darnielle's work.

This newest release is the weakest yet. Whereas all five previous studio-produced albums offered some semblance of Darnielle's musical power, Heretic Pride is void. For his unique style, his relentless hooks and pulsating vocals, studio production works best when it works least. Tallahassee (2002) is the strongest of the studio-era albums. The added elements, mostly simple drums and sparse piano, were made secondary, allowing Darnielle's guitar and songwriting to remain the driving force throughout. Heretic Pride fails because these ancillary components drown Darnielle's strengths in a pool of poorly developed rhythms and unimaginative instrumentation ripped straight from the first chapter of Pop Music Production for Dummies.

Even when the energy of the past is vaguely apparent, the flawed musical textures trap the purity of Darnielle's music in a cage of ill-conceived arrangements. The fifth track, "New Zion," is burdened with tom-tom banging that channels the worst of Genesis. Later, the dragging "In the Craters on the Moon" falls into an overly long, string-heavy instrumental section that bores in its attempt to excite. "How to Embrace a Swamp Creature" is similarly crippled by backup singers and the same incessant strings that had me checking the liner notes for Phil Spector's production credit.

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