Modest Mouse:
Beyond the Cute Label

Profile by Claude Iosso

Isaac Brock, singer and guitarist for Modest Mouse opened a recent show with the promise that he would make mistakes. He assured the crowd at Moe's that time he didn't want to err, but "the beers are talkin'." Sure enough, the Issaquah trio performed listlessly and quit early when Brock broke a string. Brock left the stage after begging drunkenly for a guitar from the audience. The crowd was so unimpressed they didn't even boo the boys' departure.

True to the classic rock'n'roll form, Modest Mouse are reckless and willful. Although a couple of songs from their first two albums have rated solid college radio airplay, they show little inclination to play "Dramamine" or "Interstate 8" live. Even to the serious fan, the band's current set lists can be unfamiliar.

Still, drunken clunkers and stage experimentation can't overshadow Modest Mouse's merit as one of the best new bands in the country. Brock yelps and pleads over shimmering guitar harmonics. Bassist Eric Judy and drummer Jeremiah Green are a smooth rhythm section. Modest Mouse compositions have the urgency of the Pixies, but possess their own hypnotic beauty. At the tender age of 21, Brock writes with premature sadness and cynicism.

In 1996, Modest Mouse released two albums on Up Records, Interstate 8 and This is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About. They represented inspired and prodigious effort, including 56 and 74 minutes of unrelenting music respectively. KCMU gave heavy play to "Dramamine" and the title cut from Interstate 8. Under the Wire rated Drive among the 10 best releases of 1996.

The band released an ep earlier this summer, The Fruit that Ate Itself (K Records), and a new full-length, The Lonesome Crowded West (Up) out in late 1997. The band will go on a six-week national tour with 764-Hero. The cuts on Fruit are more aggressive and less brooding than the group's work last year, but the songs remain compelling.

Modest Mouse has yet to parse its regional popularity into national exposure, but Brock is not too discouraged. On a rainy Saturday morning in June, he's more upset about a hatchet piece that recently appeared in one of the local music 'zines. In an inexplicably bitter and childish broadside, the writer mocked Modest Mouse's members for being short.

When informed of Modest Mouse's rap as the "cute" band, Brock laughs. "Now we have a new rap. We're the short band."

Actually, more important than commercial success or cosmetic reputations to Brock is maintaining his artistic inspiration.

"Losing it and still going -- that's a bad thing," Brock says and shakes his head. "More than anything, I don't want to lose it and dry up."

Although barely old enough to drink, the boys already have about three years of playing together behind them. Brock, who admired the Tree People, Talking Heads, the Beatles and the Pixies, first formed Modest Mouse with Judy and Green in 1992, when Brock and Judy were about 17 and Green was 15. Uninspired students or outright dropouts in sleepy Issaquah 15 miles east of Seattle, the three teens devoted themselves to the music and became "super good," according to Brock. Brock, who wrote and sang all the songs, named the group Modest Mouse after the label pinned to working people in a book he read.

Judy was struggling with personal problems at the time though, and quit. Brock continued to produce songs, sometimes alone with his guitar, sometimes with Green, sometimes with other friends. Three Modest Mouse tapes of about 40 songs each came out of it. "I was terrible," Brock says.

When Modest Mouse's second guitarist and bassist quit, Judy rejoined and the trio have been stable since. Brock says they get along better than they ever have. Brock is the showman, the songwriter and non-stop raconteur in interviews, while Judy and Green are content to quietly play their backing roles on stage and off. They are skilled musicians though, giving the three-piece band a surprisingly lush sound. Brock said, "They're the talent, I'm the personality."

The depth of the songs sets Modest Mouse apart. Brock, a vulnerable looking guy even with his dark hair in a crew cut, wrings sweet hooks from his guitar while he sings about dirty fingernails and desolation under a pretty sunset. The protagonists in many of Modest Mouse's songs are on the road, but the destination is fuzzy at best.

"I'm on a road shaped like a figure eight.

I'm going nowhere, but I'm guaranteed to be late. ...

I drove around for hours. I drove around for days.

I drove around for months and years and never went no place."

In "Dramamine," the hero's relationship on a journey so dizzying and painful that the listener can see the interstate stretch out for miles and know why he needs to swallow dramamine.

Finally, Brock provides one of the keenest observations on travel in "Space Travel is Boring."

"Man shot to the moon.

I bought a paperback and want to go real soon.

I'm shot to the moon.

Been there a half an hour; I want to come home soon."

Brock comes by his concern with roaming honestly. He was born and grew up in Montana, before moving to Eugene, Ore. He moved to Issaquah when he was in fifth grade. Brock dropped out of high school after 10th grade. In the two years that followed, he lived for months at a time in Washington, D.C. and New York City.

He moved back to Issaquah after his girlfriend in those East Coast cities broke up with him.

"She changed her religion, decided she was into girls and what not," Brock says matter-of-factly. He likes to tell yarns and seems incapable of withholding even the most private detail. "She's still one of my best friends. That's cool. I'm kind of a lesbian too. I love girls."

At his mother's urging, Brock enrolled in a program that allowed him to earn a high school diploma. He even attended some classes at Bellevue Community College, where he says he made up elaborate excuses that were more difficult than just doing the homework.

Brock lives in a shed on his stepfather's property. By day, he does landscaping work for his stepfather. He points out the grape vines, poppies and Japanese pear trees in the yard.

In 1995, a band that included Dann Gallucci on a second guitar and John Wickert on bass put out a single on K Records, "Dukes Up b/w It Always Rains on a Picnic." Funny and sad at the same time, the single established Modest Mouse's abilities at producing a pretty melody with some edge to it.

Later that year, the band recorded a single for Sub Pop, "Broke" b/w "Whenever I Breathe Out, You Breathe In: Positive, Negative." In 1996, Modest Mouse put out its third single, "A Life of Arctic Sounds," on Suicide Squeeze Records. Gallucci played additional guitar and Steve Wold, the producer, played organ.

Then Up Records produced "Interstate 8" and "This is a Long Drive ...," which on vinyl is a truly epic double album, with two more songs. On a few cuts on each of those albums, Brock's sometimes harsh, sometime tremulous tones are balanced by the luminous voice of Nicole Johnson, one of Judy's friends. Brock said she will record on more songs with Modest Mouse.

Modest Mouse has never signed a contract with the Seattle indie. They don't want to.

"In a contract, (the record company) gets stuff and we get what we'd get anyway," Brock says. "I might sign a contract though at some point. I don't want to work crap jobs all my life. If I could get enough mad cash to buy a house; it beats renting."

Brock makes no bones about his uncompromising artist's temperament. When asked why Modest Mouse doesn't regularly perform its best known songs, Brock shrugged. "I get bored of playing songs; their time's past."

Why does Modest Mouse put on lousy shows sometimes?

"Sometimes we're fairly right on when we play," Brock said. "Sometimes we're not there, because of whatever factor right then. Being too drunk is not a good one." Explaining the Moe show, he said, "We played shows every weekend and sometimes on the weekend you're drunk."

Brock is not so glib when trying to explain how Modest Mouse's songs come to possess their deep perspective when the oldest member, Judy, is only 22. As they grow older, people tend to take a broader life view that accommodates disappointments and regrets, I explained.

"Maybe I got disappointed a lot early on," Brock answered.

Claude Iosso reviews The Moon and Antarctica, by Modest Mouse

Claude Iosso reviews The Lonesome Crowded West, by Modest Mouse