No.4
in the Best Of 2004 Top 20
Helmed
by lisping, angry-slacker frontman Isaac Brocks, Seattle’s
Modest Mouse had been lurking in the caverns of credibility
for over a decade before this release melvined them into
the mainstream. Good News… survives its
sunshine production (completely at odds with the scratchy
Modest Mouse sound of old), and cannily side-steps the
sleepy tweeness that Mercury Rev and Flaming Lips succumb
to. The songs may be shorter but they still rock, and
Brocks’ vocals still take the breath away. Anally-retentive
purists take issue with the comparative brevity to this
new record, but the rest of us just lap up that rarest
of things: a million-selling, radio-friendly guitar rock
album of intelligence and grace, composed by indisputable
and uncompromising alt-rock pioneers.
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