Modest Mouse- is this an old topic?

WTF??? I can't remember where you're from, Nude Spock, but I'm going to go out on a limb and guess it's in the UK, because these folks get a Strokesworthy amount of press in the US. (They've also been one of Pitchfork's hard-on bands for the past three years.)

Personally, I wish they were better: when they're on, that sound works really well -- but the monotone vocal yipping starts to grate over the course of a record, especially when half of the tracks are just pointless drudgery. Lonesome Crowded West and the singles collection are both decent, I'd say; all of their other full- lengths would have been better off as EPs.

Lonesome Crowded is closer to Moon & Ant. in terms of the song structure; production (by Calvin Johnson) is much more primitive, but some of their best songs can be found there.

Not sure where you get that bit about them being lame musicians or his voice not being much at all. They have quite a bit more impressive instrumentation than most acts, which is one of the nice things about them, actually. Throwing in cellos and interesting changes, being able to make a long song interesting; these are things that impress me. Maybe you're thinking about a different band? The vocalist has about 4 different singing styles, all of which are as effective and sincere-sounding as the 1 or 2 you usually get from a front man. I dunno, though. I haven't heard their whole discography, so maybe what you're saying applies to older albums.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wz3GosRV3TI

I think this song is from the new album.

My favorite Modest Mouse is from '95 to '00.

I still like the newer stuff.

the answer is trailer trash

And I shout that you're all fakes
And you should have seen the look on your face
And I guess that's what it takes
When comparing your bellyaches
And it's been a long time
Which agrees with this watch of mine
And I guess that I miss you,
And I'm sorry If I dissed you

No One's First and You're Next is an upcoming EP by American indie rock band Modest Mouse, set for release in August 2009. It will feature unreleased tracks and B-sides from the band's previous two studio albums, Good News for People Who Love Bad News (2004) and We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank (2007). The collection of repolished outtakes was first mentioned in February 2008 when Rolling Stone conducted a short interview with frontman Isaac Brock in their "Smoking Section" column; however, no other news regarding its release surfaced until an entire year later.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51MZC0H1P0L._SS500_.jpg

1. "Satellite Skin"
2. "Guilty Cocker Spaniels"
3. "Autumn Beds"
4. "Whale Song"
5. "Perpetual Motion Machine"
6. "History Sticks to Your Feet"
7. "King Rat"
8. "I've Got It All (Most)"

this has just leaked and also from Wiki:

Before his death in January 2008, Heath Ledger directed a music video for "King Rat", animated by Terry Gilliam. Brock stated back in 2007 that Ledger "[has] a video production company and was interested in working on something. We were talking back and forth for a while. The idea seemed to have sort of dropped, but then he just sent me an email saying that he wanted to do it." Kevin Willis, who previously contributed artwork to drummer Jeremiah Green's side project Vells, directed the video for "Satellite Skin". Willis is also known for his frequent involvement as the co-producer in the music videos of alternative metal band Tool.

there's kind of a funny bit on "baron von bullshit rides again" about how modest mouse will never play freebird

really surprised reading a bunch of threads here that not many ILXors like MM at all. people my age pretty widely consider them a classic band. i'd like to hear what others think now in 2013, since a lot of these posts are from over a decade ago.

Lonesome Crowded West is in my top 10 albums of the 90s, and I like most of This is a Long Drive, as well. I kind of tuned out when they went from a three-piece to having like 27 people onstage. But yeah - those first couple full lengths are pretty classic.

Like a lot of my favorite turn-of-the-century indie-rock acts, these guys were so good for so long. They had this amazing window where they fired off so many good records, and singles, and B-sides, and everything in such abundance: the songs went on forever, every song and album title was stuffed with words and ideas. So I don't really know what to make of the slower pace they're working at now (if indeed they're even working at all).

I like to think they're working on another great, labored album like Mood and Antarctica, but I'm not holding out hope. They were at their best when they were working fast.

really great band that I never want to listen to

95 - 00 is the classic era. I'm shocked to find out they haven't released a full-length since 2007, and any material since 2009. I agree they were better when they worked faster/looser and everything just seemed to effortlessly fall out. I don't really know what to make of them post-"Float On:" The slackened pace, Johnny Marr joining (?!), and their reputation/visibility has been in free fall for a while now. Kind of a "lost" band that was one of the defining acts of mid/late 90s indie.

i liked a few of their singles quite a bit but never really enjoyed them across the full length of an album

their last full length was quite good, better than good news, though I like that record. not a fan of the last ep - hopefully this new one they've been working on since 2010 is good. i bet it'll come out this year

SHIT LUCK

My problem with Modest Mouse is that the third verse
Is always the same as the first
If not that, then it's that the second verse
Is always the same as the first

And fuck Isaac shit likes to swear a lot
That fucking Isaac likes to swear
I swear, Isaac likes to curse a lot, curse a lot
Fuck Isaac shit likes to swear

My problem with Modest Mouse is that the third verse
Is always the same as the first
If not that, then it's that the second verse
Is always the same as the first

And fuck Isaac shit likes to swear a lot
That fucking Isaac likes to swear
I swear, Isaac likes to curse a lot, curse a lot
Fuck Isaac shit likes to swear

i used to like them a lot but float on was so, so so bad and simultaneously so, so so popular and inescapable that i couldn't really hear his voice any more without thinking of burger king or something.

still a big fan of everything up to and including the moon & antarctica, but i'm with frogbs these days. :-/

Hate these guys badly, had a friend who played them in the car all the time and god I got tired of hearing an ok enough intro to a chorus type hook repeated ad infinitum being treated as a finished song. Defining band of the mid/late 90s indeed, or something, wouldn't have said but for my exposure to them

Horrible album titles too, but that doesn't really matter, I suppose.

"Hate" is silly. "Dislike" is more accurate, I don't have to hear them anymore after all.

despite flamboyant goon being OTM, I still praise Modest Mouse for denouncing the rise of malls and the demise of truckers.

Orange Julius reference was the peak of their career. They had some great songs after that, but nothing that made me want an Orange Julius and a hot dog quite as much as that did.

thick syrup / standing in line

I checked out Good News for People Who Love Bad News out of the local library a few weeks back, with the idea that it'd been so long since I'd heard Float On that I might want to give it a try. When I put it in my disc drive though, my laptop started buzzing and chugging and whirring, so I had to force-eject it. Sometimes that happens with library CDs. I take it as a sign that I don't need to follow through.

I will always stan for Modest Mouse as having one of the best "first song, first album" contestants w/ Dramamine. But generally if I want metronomic repetitious guitar-rock college nostalgia I'll put on Pinback

I don't think Pinback have the small-town, heart of the America, paper plates, flea markets, lonely highways thing that MM does very well. Pinback's lyrics tend to be more insular, or about one person relating to another, whereas MM seem to paint these pictures of groups or communities. Sort of talking out my ass here though about records I haven't listened to in years...

I get more milage these days out of Summer in Abaddon these days than Lonesome Crowded West.

oh man, totally agreed on Dramamine. like most people I think that everything they did between LCW and M&A was their high point but they really got out of the gate with an awesome tune. maybe my favorite Mouse jam to this day.

never got the love for that song… boring

#6 most popular MM song on spotify

I really love this band but only when I tell myself that they put out a great EP in 2004 and broke right afterwards. One of my favorite guitar players and drummers also.

They really capture a particular vibe well, one that made a lot of sense to me in the very early 2000s when I was depressed and living in shitty small towns and later when I spent a lot of time driving across Montana and being at freeway gas stations in rural Washington state at night.

i love modest mouse a great deal. while in general i prefer the earlier stuff like everyone else, one of my favorite things they released is "the whale song" from 2009.

I love them terribly but the slow spacey songs like Dramamine I love a little less

i assume there is a rift between modest mouse fans who love the slow, spacey ones best and those who love the frantic, jittery ones best. i guess i like the spacey ones but i am a fan of both. do you prefer the lonesome crowded west to the moon and antarctica?

Everywhere and his nasty parlor tricks

joygoat and sufjan otm

They really capture a particular vibe well, one that made a lot of sense to me in the very early 2000s when I was depressed and living in shitty small towns and later when I spent a lot of time driving across Montana and being at freeway gas stations in rural Washington state at night.

bingo - I live in a small town in Wisconsin and it felt like a lot of the time I knew exactly what the dude was singing about.

I do prefer LCW. The weird, long, funky epics are my favourites - stuff like Cowboy Dan, Night on the sun, 3 inch horses, two-faced monsters, King Rat.. Oh I hope their new album comes out soon.

The funky epics are great but they also excelled at short no-nonsense jams like What People Are Made Of, Alone Down There and Shit Luck.

at this point "night on the sun" is probably my favorite Modest Mouse song, but that EP is the last thing I really liked by them.

Joygoat is otm, and I've been looking for a band with a similar vibe lately and can't find any.

i guess i like the spacey ones but i am a fan of both. do you prefer the lonesome crowded west to the moon and antarctica?

Which ones are the spacey ones? I'll never tire of "Float On" I think, but I mainly dig their dirge-like material à la "The Cold Part"

i like all kinds of songs they do, but they have a lot of ish songs across the board. all of their albums should probably be 3-4 songs shorter

the answer is trailer trash

― mookieproof, Tuesday, June 16, 2009 9:45 PM (4 years ago) Bookmark

"Dramamine" is def the only Modest Mouse song i don't hate

trailer trash might be the best modest mouse song.

Trailer Treesh

do I hafta be the one to mention "A Life of Arctic Sounds"? all of Building Nothing is surprisingly mint, but that song towers. love that they weren't afraid to get stupid, even if the stupidity had begun to grate by the time of We Were Dead...

polar opposites

"Florida" is not in the top tier of MM songs but I like it. It's very impressive to me how young they all were circa Lonesome Crowded West era. By that point they were a group that was very much in control of their sound.

Isn't the story that the masters for Lonesome Crowded West and This is a Long Drive are both lost? I feel like they'd make a fortune re-issuing those albums on vinyl, but I thought I'd read somewhere it's not possible. I had the Lonesome LP once - four sides; a different sequence and at least one or two different songs. I gave it away before I moved overseas (and before I realized it would be worth several hundred dollars soon after!)

found this…

found this, from april 2013
http://boards.vinylcollective.com/topic/88034-lonesome-crowded-west/

Hey dudes,
So I waiting a long ass time in the cold California night last night after the Pomona show to get some vinyl signed. After I got my record signed I asked Isaac Brock if we were going to get a Lonesome Crowded West reissue anytime soon. He told me that they have wanted to repress it for years but had not been able to locate the original masters, so they had to go back and remaster the entire thing completely from scratch. He said it was all done now and it should be OUT IN FOUR MONTHS.

Very exciting news, I hope this ends up being accurate. It was told to me by a very drunk and freshly tattooed Isaac Brock.

:\

sorry for shit typo

well at least they have the session tapes, still that fucking sucks who knows if it'll turn out good or not

He told me that they have wanted to repress it for years

haven't we all amirite?

jk it's ok

do I hafta be the one to mention "A Life of Arctic Sounds"? all of Building Nothing is surprisingly mint, but that song towers. love that they weren't afraid to get stupid, even if the stupidity had begun to grate by the time of We Were Dead...

― my collages, let me show you them (bernard snowy), Tuesday, February 18, 2014 7:26 AM (6 hours ago) Bookmark

This is probably my favorite Modest Mouse song. I assumed I was the only person who really liked this song.

I remember hearing it on a college radio show & immediately ordering a copy of This Is A Long Drive... only to be disappointed when the song wasn't actually on there >_<

do I hafta be the one to mention "A Life of Arctic Sounds"?

top five for me, easily, and #1 sometimes.