14 April 2026 – Princess Theatre, Brisbane – words by Thomas McCall
John Darnielle has spent 35 straight years prolifically honing his craft as a songwriter, grafting away and retaining day jobs well into his 30’s while carving out a touring and recording career that eventually took off enough in popularity to see him become a full-time musician and to sell out tours across the world. Throughout this entire stretch, he has remained as singular and idiosyncratic as ever, writing hyper-literate tales of dysfunctional relationships, alcoholics, professional wrestlers, supernatural beings and whatever else strikes his interest and helps him convey his neurotic but ultimately life-affirming worldview. As bizarre and humorous as many of his songs are, his songwriting still manages to feel confessional and raw, inhabiting characters who can display universal experiences and detail painful ordeals from his past. They’re very much a cult band that have developed an ever-larger niche for themselves, at times pigeonholed into the lo-fi indie rock scene from the 90’s and then later as part of the resurgence of alternative folk that peaked in popularity throughout the 2000’s. Beyond any fleeting musical trends that have buoyed their popularity at points, they’ve always retained a core of intensely devoted fans and looking through the crowd at tonight’s gig, they continue to resonate across generations as there are significantly more young people here than you’d expect from a band that formed in 1991. There’s something universal and timeless about their music and that was on full display here tonight at the Princess Theatre as part of their first Australian tour in nine years.
The support act tonight are The Inadequates, a local folk trio featuring an acoustic guitar, a mandolin and an accordion, with all three members sharing vocal duties. The suited-up group belt out overlapping harmonies on top of their complex and constantly shifting arrangements. They perform with a lot of energy and have the crowd on their side the whole time – at points even acting surprised by the rousing reception they’re receiving from an already nearly-packed venue. They add to their good will by covering local stalwarts Ball Park Music and overall set the stage well for a night of exhilarating and raw music.
With a Go-Betweens song as entrance music, The Mountain Goats take the stage to rapturous applause and immediately tear into ‘Rocks in My Pockets’ from their new album, the oddly titled Through This Fire Across Peter Balkan. It’s an unassuming but beautiful start to the set and transitions straight into the more frenetic ‘First Blood’ from 2022’s Bleed Out which sees Darnielle booming out the refrain “John Rambo never went to Vietnam” before pacing back and forth across the front of the stage in the show’s first serious burst of adrenaline. The current live band is a three-piece featuring Matt Douglas on a variety of instruments but beginning tonight on his keyboard and indie rock drumming royalty Jon Wurster decked out in a pink blazer. He’s been touring for over 30 years with the hugely influential DIY alt-rock band Superchunk and has been a Mountain Goats member for nearly 20 years and provides a heap of creativity and subtlety to his playing throughout, able to complement the huge dynamic range of the band’s material across the set.
In the first half-hour Douglas had already switched to the bass guitar and then during a pained, melancholy rendition of ‘Moon over Goldsboro’, out comes his saxophone as he blasts out a wrenchingly emotional display from his third instrument of the night and it really cements how unflinchingly the band manages to deliver all the varied life experiences detailed in Darnielle’s songs. He’s a songwriter heavily steeped in the character-study tradition, using fictional tales that range from the mundane to the grandiose and mythical, but that as Darnielle has clarified before in interviews, all serve as a roundabout way to write about his own life. Seeing these stories come to life in person is very affecting especially alongside a sold-out crowd belting out the lyrics alongside John. It’s a moving experience and the way to really understand why The Mountain Goats often have such dedicated, obsessive fans is to experience them live and become part of the collective catharsis.
The material from tonight’s set spans over three decades of work and as the band sans-John retreat from stage after the sixth song, he takes the opportunity to delve into some deep cuts from early on in his career. After playing the more recent ‘Psalms 40 2’ on an audience request, out comes the triumphant ‘Grendel’s Mother’ from Zopilote Machine, released in 1994 in his ultra lo-fi days. Another old tune, ‘It Froze Me’ is potentially the most beautiful and emotionally affecting moment of the night, a gorgeous, stripped back love song that has the crowd swaying in silence before erupting in applause as soon as it finishes, clearly having a profound impact on everyone here. The band returns and the rest of the set features a suite of more urgent and energetic rock songs, with John moving to the keyboards at one point and Matt Douglas moving onto electric guitar for his fourth instrument of the night. John is darting around the stage after he gets back on his guitar and ‘See America Right’ is a particular highlight, an explosion of energy showing the great contrast of moods that the band is achieving tonight. John announces that the set is coming to an end and after reminiscing about previous Brisbane trips and great times at Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, its time for ‘This Year’, for which the term “fan favourite” would be a huge understatement. The song is an incredible defiant ode to perseverance and John allows himself to step away from the mic at different times because the audience is drowning out his vocals through how passionately everyone is belting out the chorus “I will get through this year if it kills me”. As cliched as it may be to say, in times as precarious and stressful as we’re living through now, this moment takes on extra significance and acts as a rare hopeful rallying cry.
After an unending roar from the crowd calling for an encore, the band returns for four more songs, ending the set on ‘No Children’ from 2002’s Tallahassee, another long-time classic of theirs. While introducing the song, they jam on the intro while John quips about needing to play this song to warn the divorcees in the audience from reuniting. It’s hilarious to think of any divorcees that have come to the show together and feeling called out directly. It gets a big laugh from the crowd and we go right into belting out the dark humour of the refrain “I hope you die, I hope we both die” as the band wraps up an inspired and thrilling set, showing that a band doesn’t have to lose any of its vitality after 30+ years of touring.
