Isaac Brock

To be fair, it's not, like, two random people.

It's James Mercer from The Shins and Isaac Brock from Out of Smiles.

Yes, but I even think now

whoever they're...

we we're in a good spot right now where we have the appetite to discuss uh you know some different bands that we don't spend a lot of time discussing and and even for both of us um you know two weeks in a row for me in the sense that like i'm more green with this band that we're talking about today than you are um but you know that kind of like initial like all right like i i just i just arrived on scene like i'm excited to explore and like that's the that's the feeling um you know that keeps you coming back to music but i totally agree with what you were saying earlier um in the sense that like i think you can you can be too young and too inexperienced in the ways of the world um to the point that like you're not gonna relate to this music until you spend some time like living in the world and like you know experiencing disappointment or experiencing uncertainty and whatnot like in the same way that like you know 12 year old probably isn't going to jive with modest mouse the same way that like a 22 year old is like you know after college or after high school figuring out what they're going to do because they occupy a very very similar part of the music world and um yeah it's the type of stuff to listen to when you're thinking about things and uh it's just it's just really good it challenges you uh because it doesn't sound like it doesn't sound like anything else that was really happening yeah in the 90s um and like you said Doug Marsh's voice, it can be a little abrasive.

Some of the guitar parts are kind of in your face in the same way why we love Isaac Brock and Modest Mouse.

It just kind of cuts through the monotony that you can fall into when it comes to listening to alternative music.

And it really just reaches out and it kind of grabs you if you have the prior experience to be able to relate to it.

I read the whole thing about Modest Mouse.

And then the second song, Center of the Universe, it has that wailing guitar intro where you're just making some really interesting sounds.

And similarly to how Isaac Brock and Jeremiah Green would play off of one another with vocals guitar and drums there's a lot of that going on with doug and and the drummer scott plouffe on this thing like um scott his drumming is so tight throughout this record and it's just kind of that like that stop start motion that exists in this in this type of genre like i think that's a really essential element of what's going on here And it just it just kind of, you know, even even in like a three minute song, it kind of elongates it because like there's very specific portions of the song.

You can tell when things change in it.

But I got to tell you briefly like a little story about meeting Isaac.

Is Isaac Brock? So I used to be in a band and we were recording an album on Mississippi Avenue, which is in Portland.

And so I'm walking down there waiting for our time to come.

We were like, we'd get there two hours early and have some beers and stuff like that.

You know, like

Isaac Brock, like, you know, his vocals are, you know, they are what they are.

I mean, but then you go ahead and like, you know, I mean, I hear a lot of influence on like the Mac DeMarcos, MJ Lendermans.

Like you said, there's Isaac Brock.

There's Billy Corgan.

There's a ton of people that don't sing, you know, it's like Brian Sella.

I mean, that was in heavy rotation.

But it sounds, it doesn't, it sounds to me like Isaac Brock and the Modest Mouse guys listened to a lot of Built to

Spill.

Except, you know, now I remember remembering, we talked about this on the show.

old when he started Built to Spill.

I'm not saying you're wrong.

I'm going off of something that is totally unscientific, which is Doug Marsh seems much older to me than Isaac Brock.

I know that doesn't mean anything.

Yeah.

Not being prolific in the second half of his career, band leader Isaac Brock basically put out a Modest Mouse album once every five years or so.

Their previous two albums, 2015's Strangers to Ourselves and 2021's The Golden Casket, were extremely underwhelming, with Brock making way too many concessions to himself.

Cliche, generic, modern indie pop in both sound and song styling.

It was released, I think, back in June of 2026.

And Don, some things I found out about this one here is this actually started out as a, I guess, Modest Mouse has a side project or Isaac Brock has a side project, Ugly Casanova.

This originally was intended as an Ugly Casanova album.

This is also the first Modest Mouse album since Jeremiah Green's death.

back in 2022.

And this album features Isaac Brock on vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards, synthesizers, percussions, Mellotron, slide guitar, production, and pretty much everything.

Russell Higbee on bass, guitar, keyboards, the Willitzer, synthesizer, percussion, drum programming, horns, and vocals.

Simon O'Connor on guitars, acoustic guitar, percussions, and vocals.

Sam Adams actually had a giant painting.

Is it of Isaac Brock?

Yeah.

Right? Like a, a giant painting of him.

Let's set the stage.

It's 1999, Isaac Brock is 24, and everything is about to change.

For years, Modest Miles have been a Pacific Northwest secret.

Three guys from Issaquah, Washington, making sprawling, anxious, beautifully strange records for a tiny label, playing to rooms full of people who felt like they discovered something special.

Released on June 13, 2000, this 60-minute journey marked the band's major label debut, but not a commercial compromise.

Instead, it expanded everything that made Modest Mouse unique.

Bigger production, broader sonic landscapes, and some of Isaac Brock's most thoughtful songwriting.

It's an album about space, about loneliness, about humanity, about finding meaning in a universe that often feels indifferent.

But yeah, this is, um- ...

Modest Mouse is such, like, an interesting popular band 'cause Isaac Brock's voice is so kind of distinct.

Um, it's kind of like, um, chaotic I feel like too.

Or like kind of like controlled chaos.

Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Which I think ties into Isaac Brock being from the South, if I remember correctly.

Like, like a swampiness to it or something.