In Memory of Satan

In Memory of Satan
	;
Album	Transcendental Youth
Released	2012
Artist	the Mountain Goats
Length	4:01
Previous track	"Counterfeit Florida Plates"
Next track	"Spent Gladiator 2"

In Memory of Satan is the 10th song on the album Transcendental Youth. It also appears as the 12th song on the 2021 live album The Jordan Lake Sessions: Volumes 3 and 4.

Lyrics[]

Got my paintbox out last night
Stayed up late and wrecked this place
Woke up on the floor again
Cellphone stuck to the side of my face 

Dead space on the other end
Perfect howl of emptiness
Cast my gaze around the room
Someone needs to clean up this mess

Tape up the windows
Call in a favor from an old friend

Make some scratches on my floor
Crawl down on my hands and knees
In old movies people scream
Choking on their fists when they see shadows like these
But no one screams 'cause it's just me
Locked up in myself
Never gonna get free

Something sacred, something blue
Cannons in the harbor dawn
I crawled down here to dig for bones
One more season then I'm gone 

Black drapes over the crosses
Call in a favor from an old friend

Comments by John Darnielle About this Song[]

"Everyone has spent those years, or maybe entire seasons, indoors where you don't really leave. That's when you go into the inner realms of the spirit. This guy's in hiding, and it's this most spiritual realm. That old saying holds here, that you can't be in a cave unless there's an exit, or else it's a grave." -- Mountain Goats' John Darnielle Discusses the 'Satan Record' (Rolling Stone)
"Short version is it's about how you have to worship the devil sometimes. It's not that song. Different kind of worship, same kind of devil. It's about the evil things inside you that you have to learn to celebrate and live with and think of as a part of the whole that makes up you instead of rejecting them because you won't be able to shake them and sometimes they will need to be, as we say in our Wiccan circles, honored. And I frequent several Wiccan circles. My dancing is celebrated at them." -- 2012-10-16 - Bowery Ballroom - New York, NY
"Everybody has a time they spend in darkness, and in that time they meet the darkness and personify it, and shake hands with it, and make a deal with it in some way." -- 2013-06-28 - The Soapbox -Wilmington, NC

Things Referenced in this Song[]

Live Shows this Song Was Played at[]

Videos of this Song[]

Transcendental Youth
Track list: "Amy AKA Spent Gladiator 1" • "Lakeside View Apartments Suite" • "Cry for Judas" • "Harlem Roulette" • "White Cedar" • "Until I Am Whole" • "Night Light" • "The Diaz Brothers" • "Counterfeit Florida Plates" • "In Memory of Satan" • "Spent Gladiator 2" • "Transcendental Youth" Bonus tracks: "Steal Smoked Fish" • "Tomorrow"

The Jordan Lake Sessions: Volumes 3 and 4

Track list: "In the Craters on the Moon" • "Letter from Belgium" • "Woke Up New" • "Pez Dorado" • "Picture of My Dress" • "Whole Wide World" • "Dark in Here" • "Korean Bird Paintings" • "Snow Owl" • "Against Pollution" • "The Last Place I Saw You Alive" • "In Memory of Satan" • "Bell Swamp Connection" • "Rat Queen" • "Shelved" • "Sax Rohmer #1" • "This Year" • "Have to Explode" • "Game Shows Touch Our Lives" • "Until Olympius Returns" • "The Young Thousands" • "Corsican Mastiff Stride" • "Blood Capsules" • "Hair Match" • "Solidarity Forever" • "Soft Targets" • "Black Pear Tree" • "Wolf Count" • "Never Quite Free" • "Wild Sage" • "Jazz No Children" • "Hast Thou Considered the Tetrapod" • "Exegetic Chains" • "Going Invisible 2"

In Memory of Satan

Contents

Lyrics[]

Comments by John Darnielle About this Song[]

Things Referenced in this Song[]

Live Shows this Song Was Played at[]

Videos of this Song[]

Fan Feed

In Memory of Satan

Album	Transcendental Youth
Released	2012
Artist	the Mountain Goats
Length	4:01
Previous track	"Counterfeit Florida Plates"
Next track	"Spent Gladiator 2"