I Came As A Rat

“It takes a long time, but God dies too
But not before He’ll stick it to you”

Modest Mouse is a little bit of a love ‘em or hate ‘em proposition. Yes, they’re very eccentric and Isaac Brock sings weird. They also put out enough damn catchy melodies to get them noticed and even on indie radio when they’re lucky. It’s easy to overlook the hooks and even easier not to notice the lyrics. By the way, they always have great lyrics.

Well I ain’t sure, but I been told
He’s baking cakes inside our souls
Stayed awake, took a nap
Got myself my bottles back
I’m breakin’ them out on the street
Walkin’ around in my bare feet
I do not need you to tell me that I am not a cat
I caught a ride, we caught some air
He’s never gonna cut his hair
It takes more time to make a fake
We night swam down in the lake
Washed the dirt off our intentions
Prattle on ’bout bad inventions
I came as ice, I came as a whore
I came as advice that came too short
I came as gold, I came as crap
I came clean and I came as a Rat
It takes a long time, but God dies too
But not before he’ll stick it to you
Well I don’t know, but I been told
You never die and you never grow old
Uh oh!
I came as a call, I came as flat
I came too soon so I came back
I came as flowers, I came as nice
I came as dirt and I came as its price
It takes a long time, but God dies too
But not before he’ll stick it to you
I don’t know, but I been told
You never die and you never grow old
Uh Oh!

Gravity Rides Everything

Modest Mouse has become a blast from the past for me, for better or worse. I’d never heard of them, then I loved them and listened to them all the time, then my life changed and I don’t want to listen to them very often anymore. There’s a lot of bands that I don’t particularly associate with anything just because I’ve been listening to them for so long. There has never been a time in my life without David Bowie in it, for example. When you discover something at a particular time it gets colored and affected by that time. So it’s no fault of Isaac Brock that sometimes his music makes me want to scream and hit things. Because Modest Mouse was something I shared a lot of with my awful ex-boyfriend, and on one hand I should be grateful that at least I took away some good music. On the other hand, sometimes the bad memories make me forget to appreciate how good the music is.

The Good Times Are Killing Me

Yes, sometimes the good times can get you down. How much meaningless fun can you have before you wish you were alone with nothing to do again? When your life’s not terribly exciting you envy people who go out and party and drink and get laid a lot, or whatever you imagine a good time to consist of. But when you’re out there having those good times, you realize that thing about the grass that they say. The grass you can’t have is nicer than the grass you have. And maybe getting what you’ve always wanted isn’t good for you, and fun isn’t always good for you, and maybe you should clear your schedule for a little boredom once in a while.

Fly Trapped in a Jar

Today, in the art of video, a highly cool one, and a cool song too. Though I don’t know what the song is about or what that bonked-out Seussian landscape has to do with anything. I guess you either like Modest Mouse a lot or you hate them, they’re one of those. We all know that being defensive is one of the joys of fandom. Sometime’s it’s nice to like something universally agreed upon, or nearly. But it’s equally great fun to get your hackles up and take the “you’ll never understand because you’re a Philistine” position. I really like telling people they’re a Philistine. In my self-appointed post as a web critic, I get to do that a lot. So yeah, you’re all damn dirty Philistines for not agreeing with me.

Florida

Guess what, more Modest Mouse. They’re something I picked up from my ex-boyfriend, an emo kid who also introduced me to Bright Eyes and Flaming Lips. Modest Mouse still have an aura of being hipster darlings, though I’ve got the impression most of the hipsters have moved on to newer things. Isaac Brock is almost a stately old man by that standard. Not that I have any care what the hipster flock thinks. I didn’t know about Modest Mouse before they were cool, I liked only when they’d become cool and I’ll continue liking them when they’ve ceased being cool. Because, dammit, they’re a good band who deserved to get a little attention from the mainstream. They’ve got some originality at least, which is ever in short supply. Nobody sounds like Modest Mouse. Their precise formula of abrasive and melodic hasn’t yet been reverse engineered into ubiquity. They’ve not been up to very much since No One’s First And You’re Next came out in 2009, but there’s word of work beginning on a new album this year, or the next. I’ll keep an eye on it, but they need to pull off a great one if they want to stay ahead of the fickle flock.

Float On

OMG I can’t even…This totes my fave song! I mean, all the song on here are my favorite songs, but there’s some of them that I don’t necessarily want to listen to all the time. But this, this is one of those that are so favorite I’m always in the mood for it. It never fails to make me happy. Like, for reals. There’s music that’s good and that I appreciate and enjoy, but then there’s music that really gets the dopamine flowing. It’s science. Our brains respond to really catchy pops songs with a release of ‘happy chemicals’, literally a natural high. This happens regardless of whether or not your conscious mind thinks the music is good. That’s why you inadvertently start bobbing your head whenever the latest abomination from Britney Spears comes on the radio. Your conscious mind is thinking “this is terrible!” while you unconscious is all like “whistling rocks!”. Which is an interesting easily observed real-life example of mammal/lizard brain dichotomy. Except that after a while the stress of your mammal and lizard brains disagreeing with each other will give you a headache. What I’m saying is, catchy pop does things to your brain. If it’s really good catchy pop, it’s like a hit of ecstasy. That’s why I’m so incoherent right now. I’m on a totally natural brain-high.

Fire It Up

Isaac Brock is, along with Colin Meloy and Ben Gibbard, one of those singers I truly wish were better-looking. Coming right down to it, I wish most people were better looking. Those three, though, I desperately wish were at least more interesting-looking, because of the discord between the way they look (average) and how much I like their voices and the way their music makes me feel.  It’s the ongoing problem I have with stars who don’t play the part. I think being visually dramatic should be a job requirement for entertainers, but not everyone is down with that notion. And you can be cheesy and say something about the value of inner qualities, and that these guys are so talented why should it matter what they look like, but I still think what I think – rock stars should be good looking and if they can’t be good looking they should be interesting looking or at least well-dressed. Though I’ll rationally admit that Isaac Brock is a brilliant man who doesn’t deserve to get ribbed about the averageness of his appearance, I still want to imagine someone glamorous when I hear music I like.

Education

You can’t make it out, but he’s making a complaint about the shortcomings of our educational system, how he didn’t learn anything from it. Good point. That’s the general consensus, anyway. Could be talking of something else, for all I really know. But the guitar playing is so good!

Call it education
It was somewhere in between
You gave me some sound advice
But I wasn’t listening

After we had capsized
I could tell you how you thought
Well, I’m not sure
But laid to rest on the city on the wall

Not quite conversation
It was somewhere in between
You said everything is taught
And I listened patiently

All this talking pony
Still monkeys the whole time
We could not help from flinging shit
In our modern suits and ties

Our instincts, they were cringing
About how we lived our lives
It didn’t seem we’d lived enough
To even get to die

All these diss distractions
So beautifully complex
Well, I loved life’s surprises so much
I don’t want to know what’s happened

Stubborn shouting, said
“I don’t do what you do”
I don’t know
Could it really hear highly if you highly care?
And you don’t
Stubborn beauty, stubborn beauty
I’ve been away

Hardly education
It was somewhere in between
Oh, I hit the roof but I had
Aimed for the ceiling

Hardly education
All them books I didn’t read
They just sat there on my shelf
Looking much smarter than me

Good old Nostradamus
He knew the whole damn time
That always being east from west
Someone is there fighting

Stubborn shouting, said
“I don’t do what you do”
I don’t know
Could it really hear highly if you highly care?
And you don’t
Stubborn beauty, stubborn beauty
I’ve been away
Stubborn beauty, stubborn beauty
I don’t know anyway
Stubborn beauty, stubborn beauty
I don’t know
Could it really hear highly if you highly care?
And you don’t
Stubborn beauty, stubborn beauty
Uh.. I fell away
Stubborn beauty, stubborn beauty
Oh, very well, then
Stubborn beauty, stubborn beauty
Oh, very well, then
Stubborn beauty, stubborn beauty
Oh, very well, then

Oh, very well, then

Dashboard

Hands down best video ever! Totally hilarious, partly because it has nothing to do with the song it’s supposed to be representing. Of course, neither is the song itself meant to be especially deep and meaningful. Isaac Brock ad-libbed all the words to fit the tune anyway. “To see someone produce those lyrics just off the top of his head is amazing: I’ve never seen it done in such a way” marvels Johnny Marr. Quite. It worked and turned into one of their best songs, and became a big hit by their own modest standards, and earned high honors in the admittedly narrow category of Best Guitar Solos Played By Johnny Marr. And they got to make such a great video. I particularly like the bit where his hands turn into tentacles.

The Dark Center of the Universe

Live and not live. Because the live sounds mildly crappy. Still, someone, somewhere might enjoy seeing the video. Modest Mouse must be among the world’s least glamorous groups. But I’d still go see them, given the chance.