Darnielle began the new millennium with The Coroner's Gambit for Absolutely Kosher before signing to 4AD for the release of the surprisingly polished Tallahassee in 2002. We Shall All Be Healed followed in 2004, and one year later, Darnielle was back with The Sunset Tree. Remaining as prolific as ever, Darnielle turned away from the intensity of The Sunset Tree for a calmer, more reflective set of songs on 2006's Get Lonely. The accessible and assured Heretic Pride appeared in 2008. Next up was the Bible verse-inspired The Life of the World to Come, the group's sixth album for 4AD, in 2010. Switching to Merge Records in 2011, Darnielle released All Eternals Deck, which was recorded in four different studios in Brooklyn, Boston, North Carolina, and Florida with four different producers -- John Congleton, Scott Solter, Brandon Eggleston, and Morbid Angel guitarist and Hate Eternal frontman Erik Rutan -- helming various tracks. That year the band was also handpicked by Jeff Mangum of Neutral Milk Hotel to perform at the All Tomorrow's Parties festival that he was curating in Minehead, England, but they were ultimately unable to appear due to scheduling issues.
Hellhound on My Trail
The Mountain Goats Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Blues falling down like hail
Gotta keep moving
Blues falling down like hail
And the daylight keeps moving
There's a hellhound on my trail
And tomorrow Christmas day
And if today were Christmas eve
And tomorrow were Christmas day
All I would need is my little rider
And the world would fade away
Gotta keep moving, gotta keep moving
Blues falling down like hail
Gotta keep moving
Blues falling down like hail
And the daylight keeps ta worryin' me
There's a hellhound on my trail
The Mountain Goats's song Hellhound on My Trail is a mournful blues tune about being pursued by troubles that just won't go away. The song begins with the refrain "Gotta keep moving, gotta keep moving/Blues falling down like hail/Gotta keep moving/Blues falling down like hail," which expresses the feeling of being trapped in a cycle of misery and trying to outrun it.
However, it is not just any kind of trouble that the singer is running from. They assert that "there's a hellhound on my trail," which is a reference to the mythology that surrounds the blues genre. In this context, the "hellhound" is a supernatural force that has come to collect a debt that is owed by the singer. This idea is reinforced in the second verse, where the singer declares that "the daylight keeps ta worryin' me/There's a hellhound on my trail."
The third verse paints a vivid picture of the singer's potential salvation: "If today were Christmas eve/And tomorrow Christmas day/And if today were Christmas eve/And tomorrow were Christmas day/All I would need is my little rider/And the world would fade away." Here, "the little rider" could refer to a romantic partner or some other kind of comfort that the singer believes would make their troubles disappear.
Overall, Hellhound on My Trail is a moving and evocative song that speaks to the universal experience of trying to escape from the things that haunt us.
Line by Line Meaning
Gotta keep moving, gotta keep moving
I need to keep moving, constantly pushing forward
Blues falling down like hail
Depression and hardship are constantly weighing me down
Gotta keep moving
I must persist through the storms of life
And the daylight keeps moving
Time is slipping away quickly
There's a hellhound on my trail
There is a foreboding sense of fear or danger constantly following me
If today were Christmas eve
Even if it were a special day, it would not change my current struggles
And tomorrow Christmas day
Even if something good were to happen tomorrow, it would not erase my past or present difficulties
All I would need is my little rider
All I truly need is the love and support of those closest to me
And the world would fade away
With their love and presence, everything else disappears into the background
And the daylight keeps ta worryin' me
Time is constantly stressing me out
There's a hellhound on my trail
There is a constant sense of danger or pressure that is hard to escape
Contributed by Taylor V. Suggest a correction in the comments below.