Dark in Here (out June 25) was recorded the week between Getting Into Knives and Songs for Pierre Chuvin at FAME Studios, the Muscle Shoals institution that’s captured Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett, Gregg Allman, Bobby “Blue” Bland, and hundreds more. The always-creative Darnielle found new bursts of inspiration in the walls of the South's most famed studios, producing a gorgeous & tantalizing collection of songs with help from his trusted bandmates: Peter Hughes, Matt Douglas (Hiss Golden Messenger) & Jon Wurster (Superchunk, Bob Mould). Also along for the ride are Muscle Shoal studio legends like Spooner Oldham (Neil Young, John Prine, Bob Dylan) & Will McFarlane (Levon Helm, Candi Staton) 

Of their sessions, longtime Mountain Goats collaborator Peter Hughes said this:

"One of the words that John used when we were talking about the direction for Dark in Here was “wild,” which I liked a lot. Not wild in the sense of abandon—these aren’t those kind of songs. But wild in the sense of something undomesticated, untamable. Wild like the immutability of nature, the way it will take back any piece of untended space as its own, whether amidst the AutoZones and Chick-fil-A’s of Muscle Shoals [home of FAME Studios, where the album was recorded] or among the ruins of a scientific outpost on the Kola Peninsula. Wild like the whale; like a powerful animal. Or a virus—the beast that awakes, emerges from a forest, and stops the world. You can fight the calamity all you want, but either way, it’s going to demand your surrender."