![]() Not only is it not particularly cohesive, but it’s also marred by a few overproduced, ill-advised tracks almost off-base enough to make you forget why you liked this band in the first place: “Sugar Boats” is garish carnival music that shrugs its shoulders at the existential questions Brock made a career out of (“This rock of ours is just some big mistake / And we will never know just where we go / Or where we have came from”), while electro-pop stomper “Pistol (A. ![]() There’s been no longer interval between Modest Mouse records than the eight years that preceded Strangers to Ourselves, an album that seems to have been hurt, not helped, by all the time it took to come together. Brock and company were more blue-collar than flannel-clad, yet they carved out a weirdo niche that transcended the sound du jour, as evidenced by the indie-rock institution status they still enjoy today. Modest Mouse deliberately distanced themselves from Seattle’s booming grunge scene in the ‘90s, identifying more with the likes of Built to Spill than, say, Mudhoney, and they were right to do so: Lumping their nervy, mercurial sound in with any one rock trend would have done it a disservice. The sound at the core of that career has always been compellingly difficult to define. The Pacific Northwest band-founded in Issaquah, Washington, by Isaac Brock, Eric Judy and Jeremiah Green in 1992-went from playing basements at Seattle house shows to a platinum album and multiple Grammy nominations in their first decade or so together, and they’ve persisted for nearly two more, though the acclaim around their output has flagged considerably during their post-hype period. ![]() ![]() There are many ways to measure success, but by any tangible metric, Modest Mouse is one of indie rock’s biggest success stories. ![]()
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