Modest Mouse @ Barrowlands, Glasgow, 20 Jul

There's a celebratory mood in the air at the first Modest Mouse show in Scotland for seven years

Live Review by Lewis Wade | 22 Jul 2022
  • Modest Mouse

Soak (a portmanteau of “soul” and “folk”) opens with some cracking tunes about heartbreak, insecurity and wanting to be Leonardo DiCaprio. Your typical fare for the du jour solo indie-rocker in the vein of Julien Baker or Torres, but it's sadly drowned out by the milling crowd beyond the first few songs.

Modest Mouse are undeniable indie-rock royalty so it's a little surprising to find that the show isn't sold out and noticeably so, as there's still a fair amount of room once you're about halfway back in the Barrowlands. However, this does little to dim the enthusiasm of both band and audience as we're treated to a stellar selection of hits from the past 25 years.

They kick off with a quick rendition of Styrofoam Boots while waiting for drummer Jeremiah Green, then it's Teeth Like God's Shoeshine, immediately pleasing the older fans with two songs from 1997's The Lonesome Crowded West. Isaac Brock is chatty and gregarious, lamenting the impersonal limits of stage banter, but enjoying himself doing it. He's mellowed over the years, but not to a point of lethargy as his yelping tics and frenetic guitar playing easily attest.

The standout from 2015's slightly underwhelming Strangers to Ourselves, Lampshades On Fire comes early and probably gets the most rousing reception of the night bar Float On, which also appears fairly early. Despite the variety of the setlist, it settles into a groove about 20 or 30 minutes in – quite an odd groove admittedly when a plastic tub is being used as percussion and Brock veers from frenzied (Shit Luck, Fuck Your Acid Trip) to contemplative (Cowboy Dan, Baby Blue Sedan) or both together (Dashboard, Bukowski).

It feels like each era of Modest Mouse comes with its particular fans: the pre-Float On purists, the commercial era nostalgists and the newcomers who know The Golden Casket just as well as The Moon & Antarctica. Because of this, almost every song gets a warm reception, but none have that unifying power to make everyone collectively lose their shit. Maybe that's a strength of their imperious catalogue that so many songs have the potential to be favourites. On a personal note, my heart almost skipped a beat when those rangey guitar strums kicked in for Gravity Rides Everything – a near-perfect song to open an encore with. Maybe you can't please all the people all the time, but Modest Mouse certainly aren't far off.

http://modestmouse.com