"the alphonse mambo," from the coroner's gambit

q: mike, who are you?

a: i am a guy who works in an office. this is a new thing.

q: do you have a bad heat rash?

a: terrible heat rash.

q: "the alphonse mambo"?

a: when things are sweet and easy, i get obsessed with darnielle's songs about being fucked-up and down and out. when things feel crushing and difficult and transitional, i need the spirit-lifters.

q: is this really spirit-lifting?

a: no.

q: huh.

a: not a question, but that's okay. you know, it's like, i could be playing "the alphonse mambo" in my office, grooving out to the melodica, popping benadryl, or i could just get the hell out with some minor savings, one lonely ked, six yellow socks, and a bundle of nervous excitement. he does that. i couldn't care about the future not one salt lick.

"elijah," from the coroner's gambit

on a very busy day, three minutes and seven seconds to have as many goosebumps as i want.

addendum, 6/15:

i can almost barely stomach this song. i have a tendency to want to cry or throw up when i hear it. i don't know whether elijah is metaphorical or not; i don't know about the baby either. this past passover, i actually set out a cup for someone who i've been wanting to come home, next to elijah's. it didn't work. but the prick of anticipation was there; my hair stood up not because i had a reckoning, but because i imagined a reckoning to be possible. and i think a lot of darnielle's songs--i've said it a million times--are about this: not the climax per se (though he has moments of revelation), but about the way a moment can raise like a blister, the way a focused second, no matter to what end, can mean everything.

"jaipur," from the coroner's gambit

in darnielle, even the most down and out get mythologies, growling, over boom-box static, SWING LOW, SWEET CHARIOT, CHROME TAILPIPE SHINING BRIGHT AS SPUN GOLD. have you ever woken up as a badass? have you ever woken up as a nasty badass thing with a swollen eye and taken a drink and spilled out onto unfriendly streets? have you ever reached that end--the end when all of the sudden, the idea of you as a ragged and pathetic and nasty, badass thing makes you invincible? i recall nights as a mean dude--a close friend once said, "it's not that you're a drunk, it's that when you're a drunk, you're a self-glorifying one."

and that's what's at work in "jaipur": cruising into atlanta, something a little less than india, starting to imagine yourself as a holy being, looking like absolute shit, feeling a storm gathering on the horizon (the horizon being somewhere right behind your eyes with a brain full of angry mush). and it's one of the reasons i always come back to john darnielle: the self-mythologizing voice of the absolute mess.