FIRST THING U LEARN IS THAT U ALWAYS GOT TO WAIT: Modest Mouseketeers, Electric Factory, Last Night
SIMONE SECCI FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT: Never saw Modest Mouse live before and I regret that ’cause probably if I’d done that right after their masterpiece, The Lonesome Crowded West, that would have probably gotten stuck in my head as one of the best live acts of the last decade. Having the legendary Johnny Marr from The Smiths (!!!!) on the guitar and a tag team percussive duo of the two Jeremiah Green and former Black Heart Procession drummer, Joe Plummer, like saying probably the greatest one, is not enough not to make the show really disappointing. The thing is that when you’re in front of a person, whose songwriting refresh and renew the indie rock scene in the mid ’90s and inspiring so many people, you can’t avoid having great expectations. So in short why wasn’t this show great? Because the crowd was in front of a tired and depressed rock star that looked like he didn’t wanna be there and was doing all his best to not seem like. Of course anyone who is familiar with the history of the band, knows that the band had a really hard time getting away from the bad mojo.
But unfortunately — to be complete honest and respectful towards that rock music, they gave new life years ago together with the Pavement and other bands — I have to say what I just said. So it’s a well known fact that a lot of artists and musicians are really discontinues discontents, so let’s just hope in the future. I will be really sorry to loose lose the great songwriting genius of Modest Mouse.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Simone is from Italy, Rome to be exact. As such, English is his second language and though he doesn’t always use it the “right” way, he usually gets where he needs to go.
[Photo by JONATHAN VALANIA]