![\"modest-mouse\"](\"https:\/\/bandwagmag.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/modest-mouse-1024x683.jpg\")
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\u201cI\u2019m a shot in the dark mother fucker,\u201d Isaac Brock says. \u201cIf I want to try something out, there\u2019s a good chance that the person I want to get ahold of might not be busy and this may be interesting to them.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Such was the case with Johnny Marr, former Smiths guitarist, who teamed up with the Modest Mouse frontman for a short stint in 2006. It\u2019s almost a testament to Brock\u2019s relevance as a musician, when a legend like Marr is willing to join your band \u2014not that Modest Mouse has anything to prove. They\u2019ve attained more longevity than most bands. As vocalist and guitarist, Brock has plenty of stories to tell, and every single one of them is packed with precise detail; clearly a gift he translates into songwriting. Formed in 1993, Modest Mouse has put out a total of six studio albums, culminating with this year\u2019s <\/span>Strangers to Ourselves<\/span><\/i>. It\u2019s a catalog brimming with musical genius and nothing less. The first video for the track, \u201cCoyotes,\u201d makes it clear Brock has a fondness for animals. However, he wishes he would have named his band something different when they were getting started in the early \u201890s. Nonetheless, twenty-two years later, Modest Mouse is one of indie rock\u2019s biggest success stories, something he didn\u2019t necessarily see coming.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI had some required reading that I don\u2019t remember anything about,\u201d Brock says. \u201cIt was a Virginia Wolf book. I do remember not giving a shit about the story or anything. Being a young teenager, I was thinking about what was important to me and that was finding a band name. I thought about it every waking fucking hour. I came across a phrase like \u2018modest mouse killer people,\u2019 referring to the working class. If I had to do it over again, I would choose like a million other names; being cute really ain\u2019t really my fucking deal and I really didn\u2019t think I was being cute because of the context of the sentence.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Cute or not, Modest Mouse has amassed a legion of fans who seem to worship the ground Brock walks on, but he\u2019s had his share of struggles. Then there\u2019s the song \u201cGood Times Are Killing Me,\u201d off 2004\u2019s <\/span>Good News For People Who Love Bad News<\/span><\/i>, where he\u2019s basically confessing his struggles with substance abuse.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cOh, it\u2019s kind of a struggle that continues to go on,\u201d he admits. \u201cI\u2019m going to skip getting into too much detail about that song because it\u2019s just for me. I said about what I wanted to say in the song. Is that unfair? I\u2019m sorry. I\u2019m not too bothered about talking about it. I just don\u2019t have much more to add to it. Being a nefarious dude, it\u2019s pretty easy to me. I\u2019m currently fighting that sort of shit.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n At age 40, Brock has most likely learned some tough lessons along the way; about himself, the music business and everything else. While recording <\/span>Strangers to Ourselves<\/span><\/i>, he wound up creating a makeshift studio in his Portland, Oregon home he deemed the \u201cIce Cream Party.\u201d It was both a blessing and a curse.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI walked out of this project a fairly different person from when I walked in,\u201d he says. \u201cWithout the limitation of time, you can really do a lot. If we had been recording at a studio we were renting, they\u2019re going to have someone else on the books coming in on a certain date and wanting us the fuck out of there. One thing we do is take time for granted. We are amazingly adept at hanging out. We enjoy each other\u2019s company and shit, which is surprising that we haven\u2019t gotten bored of jibber-jabbin\u2019. That\u2019s one of the pitfalls is you can just do that for eight hours and then do some work. The people we had come on board to work on this, they\u2019re not operating on this schedule. They can\u2019t hang out with Modest Mouse for three solid years while we hone in on a sound. Throughout the day, you can be pretty creative and work as many hours as you want. Days started blurring together pretty god damn easily. I would fall asleep here, wake up and start working again.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n At the end of the process, the 15-track effort that resulted from those studio sessions was another piece of art Brock could proudly stand behind, whether critics agreed or not. Pitchfork, naturally, didn\u2019t have too many nice things to say, going as far as calling the song \u201cPistol\u201d the \u201cworst song Brock has ever recorded.\u201d Nonetheless, to true Modest Mouse fans, it\u2019s a triumph. It retains the authentic Modest Mouse sound Brock has become so successful with. From \u201cPups to Dust,\u201d and \u201cShit In Your Cut,\u201d to \u201cThe Best Room,\u201d and \u201cThe Ground Walks, With Time In A Box,\u201d it\u2019s solid from beginning to end. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t put out records unless I really love everything on the fucking record,\u201d he says. \u201cTime might change that. After I put out a record, having heard a song enough times, I might be like, \u2018I don\u2019t care for it, but oh well.\u2019 I never put out a record I have any misgivings about what I\u2019m putting on it. It\u2019s a record of my favorite songs. I kept the 30 or 40 songs I wrote. It\u2019s not that I didn\u2019t like them. I just didn\u2019t like them enough.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n As Modest Mouse continues its expansive tour in support of the new album, Brock\u2019s opinion on touring has changed over the years. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt used to be the driving,\u201d he says. \u201cNow the worst part is the waiting, really. It\u2019s idle time and waking up almost every day behind a venue where the dumpsters are. We\u2019re doing bus tours now and there are eight people playing on stage so it\u2019s more work. Also, figuring out how to eat healthily. Your eating gets really fucked up. I don\u2019t really have a schedule right now. It\u2019s seemingly detrimental. There aren\u2019t a lot of places with late night, healthy options. So what do we eat after the show? Most of us don\u2019t eat four to five hours before the show. I pretty much don\u2019t. I might nibble, but I don\u2019t eat until after I play the show. People would say, \u2018I got pizza\u2019 and I would lose my shit like, \u2018That\u2019s not food! It\u2019s just filler. Quit getting pizza. Don\u2019t fucking do this please. It\u2019s killing me.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cI\u2019m a shot in the dark mother fucker,\u201d Isaac Brock says. \u201cIf I want to try something out, there\u2019s a good chance that the person I want to get ahold of might not be busy and this may be interesting to them.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":41,"featured_media":14348,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[1715,1714,748],"aioseo_notices":[],"yoast_head":"\n