Go West goes a lot of places. Fundamentally a romantic comedy about a guy and a cow, it's also a rousing, violent western, a framework for pratfalls, and a sad, poignant story about loneliness, and the abatement of loneliness. The critics say Go West is Keaton's great experiment in pathos. If that means it'll rip your guts open by conflating sadness with joy and love with absurdity then it's a pretty commendable critical stance.

We watched Go West over and over until it sort of opened itself up and we got to feel we understood it in our way. Then we wrote what we understood into music. We didn't feel any responsibility toward historical accuracy because Go West is not a museum piece but a living, relevant film, all full of things that are important to our lives now. We worked with the music we listen to — folk, noise, punk, country — all ground together in the blender of deciding to make something up and poured out into our little orchestra of fiddles and pianos, tape loops and drums. We could only make music that reflected what the movie made us feel; in that sense I guess it's a little tyrannical, like a playbill that presumes to tell you how to feel about the play. But it's a gentle tyranny. After playing the show a few times a few people told us they forgot we were there — it was just them and Buster. That's the idea. That's the right idea.

"Go West was elevated to brand new heights with much owed to The Rats and People Motion Picture Orchestra ... I can say that this was the greatest live scoring I've ever experienced. They sounded like a slightly less modern version of The Dirty Three. Maybe I'm just a sucker for a good violin, but I would gladly pay for a recording of their performance. The film was good. The hilarity of Buster Keaton riding a cow through Los Angeles while wearing a skin-tight devil costume can never be underestimated. But, when paired with the Rats and People Motion Picture Orchestra, it is a near-masterpiece."

The R&P MPO in action at Off Broadway in St. Louis

Past Performances:

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