The Mountain Goats have announced a new album. Arriving October 27th via Merge Records, “Jenny From Thebes” marks the sequel to the band’s 2002 LP “All Hail West Texas”. Ahead of their new record, the Mountain Goats have release lead single “Clean Slate.” As frontman John Darnielle explains it, “Jenny From Thebes” is a rock opera about a woman who buys a Kawasaki to ride as far away as possible from a town that she’s been carrying on her shoulders for too long. “‘Clean Slate’ sets the scene: This is the house Jenny rents; these are the people who crash there when they need a place to stay; this is where she’s at in the process of becoming someone other than the keyholder she’s been,” he said in a press release.
Produced by Trina Shoemaker and recorded at the Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma, “Jenny From Thebes” features guitar by Bully’s Alicia Bognanno, horn and string arrangements by Matt Douglas, and backing vocals from Kathy Valentine of the Go-Go’s and Matt Nathanson.
The new LP follows the Mountain Goats’ 2022 album, “Bleed Out”, which was produced by Bognanno and drew inspiration from action flicks from the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s. Darnielle described the tracks on that record as “uptempo mini-action movies” that were filled with their own “plots, characters, heists, hostages, questionable capers, getaway cars, all that stuff.”
Since releasing “Bleed Out”, Darnielle showed up in Natasha Lyonne and Rian Johnson’s crime comedy Poker Face, where he played a guitarist for a one-hit-wonder rock band called Doxxxology. The band is fronted by a character named Ruby Ruin—played by Chloë Sevigny.
“Clean Slate” by the Mountain Goats, off the album, “Jenny from Thebes”, out October 27th on Merge Records.
The Fat Angel Sings 