So everybody NEEDS to get the new Modest Mouse record. The name, creepy considering I now work on a ship, is ‘We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Went Down, We Were Lucky’
It follows a number of very good albums, all of which I have enjoyed immensely. However I always had my reservations about how much I really liked the band. I heard tracks and thought that they were the best band I had heard in years. Then a weak lily-livered song would follow and I would want to toss the disc away.
Now they have arrived with something that is mature intelligent witty and so easy to enjoy without being “easy”. The LS has decided, to my joy, to throw away his gentle crooning and throw his voice out there with guts and strength and most of all passion. It is like he bumped into Win Butler who told him to stop trying to ballad us to death. It works, past albums gave us songs like ‘bury me with it’ ‘Alone down there’ ‘Cities of Ashes’ etc Songs with passion and drive. I like nothing more than a vocalist who has the guts to throw his voice out there and see what happens. Too many are afraid to be so exposed.
I think this album, although more mad, vocally. Is probably the most listenable. Many have said it is a safe album, but I disagree. I think it is gutsy as hell. 8 minute songs, accordians, repetitive phrasing, odd timing, a steady theme, Songs about flies in a jar for heavens sake. I mean if that isnt screaming “PLEASE DONT GIVE ME RADIO PLAY” I dont know what does. The trumpet in Spitting Venom makes me so happy I could cry.
If there is one thing I did not like, and this is clutching at very sparse straws, was the repetitive phrasing in parting of the sensory. The problem for me is it is such a strong song and I really enjoy it, I adored the repetition the first couple of listens, but it gets tired very quickly.
Stand out tracks
March into the Sea
Dashboard
Fire it up
Spitting Venom
Education
The other thing I really like about the album, is it is an hour long. Far too many artist are making 30 minute albums. That is NOT a 3 course meal. It is an hor d’ ouvre. I am not in the business of listening to albums that dont have enough respect to make an album longer than a Godspeed song.
Anyhow…excellent. Get it
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December 10th, 2007
7287pwkr
So Ships
I figures some of you might be interested in what life is actually like on a ship. What we have etc etc.
The ship is like a little village or a floating hotel.. Total at peak capacity it has 1750 people on it. There are 650 crew and about 1100 guests. That many guests is like a mini version of hell.
For the guests there are shops and various other things to do. There is actually a “university” on board. It is a place that guests can come and study computery stuff. There are so many repeat guests that some of them actually do courses that take some time to do. 6 months or more. There is also a person who teaches people how to play a yamaha keyboard, a bridge coach (bridge coaches are ALL knobs ALL knobs, like you have no idea)
Then they have lecturers too, this cruise there is a guy who is Frank Sinatra biographer, one of the original guys from Argentina who inspired the movie “Alive”, a wine lecturer, comedians, puppeteers, last cruise a man who stood on the moon etc etc.
They are actually quite interesting, but you dont want to serve them in the dining room, because they are professional talkers, so land up staying late, entertaining the other guests. The lectures are all recorded and play on our televisions, so if someone is interesting you can have a listen.
This ship is top of the luxury liners so tends to have the best of everything. The guests are often like little children, seriously. Whining in such a childlike manner, sulking if they dont get something their way. None of them, bar the non American ones have table manners. Its very interesting, because I would like to know how a waiter in America knows when a guest is done as non of them put their cutlery together when done eating.
80 percent of the ship is American and the rest is made up of Canadians, British, Japanese, Thai, some Chinese and some Mexicans.
Crew life is interesting too, we are 650 including Officers, who are the dicks in white uniforms. 
they have their own bar and mess. The crew officer is the person responsible for trying to keep everyone happy. They try and have something fun for us to do every night, a tai chi lesson, movies, jacuzzi, there is often a party with free booze and some speciality food. So far no South African night, but I think we will get round to it eventually. Things are very cheap in the crew mess, which is our shop, open 1 hour a day. I cant tell prices…as that would be telling.
The one thing that just is a bit much that you cant get away from is, there are hardly any new faces in the crew. We maybe get 5 new people every 2 weeks. It makes you a bit depressed going to the crew bar, as you get there and think…Shit… I am tired of talking to the same people, maybe I should just go back to my cabin…AH my cabin, I will get to that next time.
Enough for today, I am already bored of my writing.
The Brr
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November 27th, 2007
7287pwkr
This is one of the saddest days I have had on the ship.
South Africa have just won the Rugby World Cup and I am here on this rolling monstrosity picturing my friends and family having the most amazing time.
I am not sad that I missed us winning. I am sad that I never got to experience, again, the joys of the build up. The stresses and stomach pains. The moment when your boys run onto the field, and they are YOUR boys. They belong to us and we love them.
I was screaming with joy in the crew bar with all the other South Africans. I was singing and cheering and whooping for joy. But it was so hollow. All of us faking joy as much as possible to pretend that we are human again, that we can feel. Instead of the usual hollow work work work that we do.
So that is my thought for the day, a hollow joy. I feel nothing but the desire to feel something. Well done my beautiful boys.
Peace girlguy/guyguy TheBrr
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October 20th, 2007
7287pwkr
So I got the new Radiohead album a couple of days ago. Its called In Rainbows(IR) which I think is a fantastic title and the artwork is super as well. Well I think so, as I have just seen it on the website and as yet I only have a nicked version, I have all the good intentions of buying the special edition when I reach a place which actually stocks it. I have been at sea for 2 months and have not been in an English speaking city for those entire two months. I don’t think that Contanza in Romania even has a MP3 player never mind a person who could direct me to the nearest shop with the Special Edition Radiohead Album.
A friend of mine JJ suggested that IR was better than Hail To The Thief (HTTT). I disagree. For me httt was the culmination of years and years of work and growth from the band. It encapsulates everything from The Bends to Amnesiac. Everything that they had done well, 90’s rock to their newfound love of electronica blended so well into an album with soul and warmth that moved me so much. It is easily one of my all time favourite albums and I find it very difficult to compare anything with it.
I have a bad habit of being disappointed with Radiohead albums and then a few months later retracting my words proclaiming that they have once again reinvented what musicians should be doing. I did it with Kid A and had to retract my words 6 months later when I listened to it in the way it deserved, without comparing it with Ok Computer.
So maybe I am playing with fire when I write with less than absolute enthusiasm about IR. There are a number of standout tracks which have blown me away, but I think that maybe Thom and the boys have been listening to far too much Sigur Ros and Aphex twin recently. The rhythm is sigur and the beats are Aphex. I don’t like the coldness of Aphex twins music. The beats have given the same coldness to IR.
Kid A has a lot of electronica, but it was warm and taken from real instruments all twisted up. The main thing I love about Radiohead is the way they reinvent music every album. It doesn’t hold true for this album. I hear Eddie Vedder’s voice all the time. Especially from the album ‘yield’ I think the song is ‘evolution’. The other band I hear a lot is Sugardrive, now I know that that is clutching at straws as Radiohead have never heard of Sugardrive never mind heard their music. The sounds that Radiohead are creating are very similar to the album ‘When I Died I Was Elvis” which is about 10 years old, but Sugardrive did these twisted sounds with the distorted voice ten years ago.
There are a few tracks which are fantastic, Bodysnatchers and All I Need. Bodysnatchers has one of the most wonderful changes in rhythm I have heard in a long time. All I need is very quiet for a long time and it is a very short song. It is a teaser of the highest degree. The last minute is exquisite, I wish I could sleep in that percussion/ piano combination. It makes the album worthwhile. I have been humming House Of Cards for the last two hours. The entire album is very listenable but nothing jumps at me like when Thom screamed “Because…” in 2+2 =5
I am comparing this album with its predecessors, which might be unfair. I have not stopped listening to it for two days solid. It is a thoroughly enjoyable album, but when you are genius you will be compared with what you did before and they have done much better.
I am sure I will eat my words…
Peace TheBrr
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October 19th, 2007
7287pwkr
