Indiecast - A Tribute To Low's Mimi Parker + The 25th Anniversary Of 'The Lonesome Crowded West,' Plus: Will The Swifties Topple Ticketmaster?

Episode Date: November 18, 2022

It's hard to decide which indie album released in 1997 was the best since there are so many great ones to choose from. There's Elliot Smith's Either/Or, Yo La Tengo’s I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One, and Built To Spill’s Perfect From Now On. But this week on Indiecast, hosts Steven Hyden and Ian Cohen are looking back on 25 years of an album that meant a lot to both of them at the time: Modest Mouse's The Lonesome Crowded West (41:28). They reflect on that era of indie music and decide if Modest Mouse is underrated, overrated, or properly rated at this point.In terms of indie news this week, Indiecast would be remiss if they didn't discuss the Grammy nominations this week (2:51). Plus, Steven and Ian talk about the Taylor Swift/Tickemaster bungle (12:08) and give a thoughtful tribute to Low's Mimi Parker (26:43), who sadly passed away earlier this month.In this week's Recommendation Corner (52:47), Ian gives a shout out to Japanese emo band Injury Tape, whose debut album came out earlier this year. Meanwhile, Steven suggests listeners should check out Guma, whose album A List Of Sightings dropped in February and has been compared to Steely Dan and '70s soft rock.New episodes of Indiecast drop every Friday. Listen to Episode 115 here and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. You can submit questions for Steve and Ian at [e-mail], and make sure to follow us on Instagram and Twitter for all the latest news. We also recently launched a visualizer for our favorite Indiecast moments. Check those out here.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Indycast is presented by Uprocks's Indie Mix tape. Hello everyone and welcome to IndieCast on the show we talk about the biggest indie news of the week, review albums, and we hash out trends. In this episode, we paid tribute to the late Mimi Parker of Loeb and look back at Modus Mouss' The Lonesome Crowded West for the album's 25th anniversary. My name is Stephen Hayden and I'm joined by my friend and co-host. He was just nominated for a Grammy for Best Indie Rock Personality, Ian Cohen, Ian, Ian, how are you?

And now that I got a taste of this Grammy prestige, we're just completely pivoting to Grammy cast. Like month-long deep dives on the Black Pumas and hers discography. I'm never going back. We are straight up protect the shield for the Grammys now. Can I just say that when I did the first run through on our introduction, I had a flub. I accidentally called you Indy Cohen. But I feel like maybe that should be your new branding. You know, like, in your public-facing persona, instead of Ian Cohen, you should be Indy Cohen.

It's like so close to your actual name. You know, maybe this could be your thing. Maybe this is your path to Fantano like numbers. You know, you can be like the TikTok guy. Like, hi, I'm Indy Cohen. And then you talk about some record. What do you think? I think this could be a good idea.

Like, I could have stumbled accidentally into a get-rich, quick. scheme for you. Yeah, this one will get me rich and quick. Yeah, I look, I'm Indy Cohen. Like, honestly, like, I love that one because you can just immediately, like, that's an extremely hateable nickname. And so that's really what gets the, I don't know much about TikTok, but like, if you see someone like me introducing themselves as Ian, Indy Cohen, you're just going to like, say, like, fuck this dude, you're probably going to screenshot me. And then I'll I'm just going to do Fontano numbers.

I'm going to be the top bald guy in the music writing sphere. Well, and that's why I think it'll work because I think stupid ideas tend to do really well in that sphere. You know, like, it's so dumb that I think it would work, that if you were an indie rock critic named Indy Cohen, it could just be like, I don't know, it's so dumb that it's genius, I think. I think that's what's holding us back as IndyCast. We're too cerebral. All these episodes about the Muse Second Law and the pronunciation of Waxahatchy. It's just going over people's heads. We need to, like, dumb it down real quick.

We're talking about the Grammys because the Grammys were announced this week. I don't expect any of you out there to know this or to care about it. But I like looking at the Grammy nominations, particularly like the Robby. performance category is always like my annual having a good laugh at the Grammy's expense. And this year was no different. Right at the top, Beck was nominated for Best Rock Performance for his cover of Old Man, the Neil Young song that I believe was recorded specifically for an NFL commercial. Am I wrong on that?

Because I remember that was in the, it was in a commercial advertising. a game with Tom Brady. And Tom Brady was the old man in this scenario. I think Aaron Roger, I think it might have been like the Buccaneers versus Packers. I feel like Aaron Rogers. That wasn't a Monday, but that was an afternoon game though. That wasn't a national game.

So I don't think the Packers were involved. I think it was just Tom Brady. I don't know if he recorded it specifically for that, but that's just the avenue in which most people have heard it. And I just love, like, how, I just want to imagine the Grammy nominating committee and, like, determining, nope, not best rock song. This is a best rock performance because, I mean, I don't think the, I don't think the original Neil Young song, Old Man was nominated for a Grammy ever, right? Oh, God, no. Oh, God, no. Was Neil Young, like, like, totally anti-Gran.

Like, did the Grammy nominating committee, like, not fuck with Neil Young back in the day? That doesn't seem possible. I don't know. I mean, you know, look, I mean, the Grammys, this is the funny thing about the Grammys, because you see people out there who get genuinely upset every year about the Grammys being terrible, and it really is a Charlie Brown with the football type situation where, you know, Lucy's pulling it away at the last minute. You know she's always going to pull it away. The Grammys have never been good.

I mean, this is the thing I always try to emphasize with people in Grammy discourse. It's not like there was a time where the Grammys. were getting it right, having great taste. That was never true. It's always been bad. There have been times when they accidentally got things right just because, you know, it would have been, you know, it's like, you know, falling in a lake or something, you know, that doesn't mean you're a great swimmer. It just means that you fell in a lake. You know, so Stevie Wonder was so commercially successful and so great in the 70s that you had to give them a Grammy.

You know, it was just unavoidable. But for the most part, they're terrible. I just want to get back to Best Rock Performance here. So we have Beck, this is an alphabetic order. Old Man, the Neil Young cover. Beck won, Neil Young Zero, as far as nominations go for that song. The Black Keys, Wild Child. I don't know if that's like a Dors cover.

Oh, is it? Maybe. I don't know. I didn't even think about that, but shit. This should be all covers for Best Rock Performance, because technically speaking, that is, in terms, entirely all about the performance, right? I guess.

I don't understand. It's like the record and song distinction. Record is the recording and the song is the songwriting aspect of it, but it's a weird distinction. Yeah, Brandy Carlisle for a song called Broken Horses. I think she's nominated in every category. Brandy Carlisle. Very popular.

And, you know, very hard to hate on Brandy Carlyle. she's doing it well out there. Brian Adams, so happy it hurts. Now, I like to think of myself as one of the pro Brian Adams music critics working in today's industry, maybe one of the few. I had no idea that Brian Adams had like a song or an album in like the last five years, at least, like 10 years. I feel like there was every now and again, like I'll see at Stereo Gum, they have this

a column called We Got a File on You where it has people who have been in the industry for a very long time. And I think there was a Brian Adams one. Like, I also think didn't Brian Adams have like kind of a weird anti-VACs sort of stance? Like, I think he said something. Did he?

I think he said something vaguely controversial in the not too distant past. But I could very well be wrong. Brian Adams. Come on, man. No, no, no, no. Here we go. Here we go.

Singer Brian Adams slammed this racist for a post blaming bat-eating people for coronavirus. That was it. Oh, okay. And he looks kind of like sting mixed with Brian Setzer in this picture. Ian, I keep trying to land this joke and I feel like it's past the point. I'm going to try one more time. Okay, would you say that that was a reckless post? No, you fucking nailed it. Perfect dismay. Perfect dismay. Perfect. dismount. Look at his album titles, kids, and you'll understand why that was a hilarious joke. Idols, Crawl, nominated for Best Rock Performance, so they're like a young buck here. We're not a fan of that band on this show, but good to see them nominated in this category. Ozzy Osbourne featuring Jeff Beck.

Wow. The guitar world contention is making its voice heard. You know, I was only aware of Jeff Beck collaborating with Johnny Depp recently. Oh, God. Jeff Beck back. No, Jeff Beck. Okay. And Johnny Depp. I guess the Grammys didn't want to pull the trigger on that one, you know, nominating

Johnny Depp so soon after his controversy. But they nominated Louis C.K. in Arcade Fire. Louis C.K. Guy nomination? I believe so, yeah. Didn't he win last year? Probably. I think he won. God, Louis C.K.

Grammy people love Louis C.K. There are literally no other comedians out there besides him and Dave Chappelle. Yeah, I guess so. And then Turnstile got dominated for the song Holiday. Hell yeah. That Taco Bell money, that Grammy money, Turnstile, man. They're going to be the Twitter favorite in this category. I really hope they go with Beck.

I really hope that he gets the trophy for the Neil Young cover recorded for an NFL commercial because with the Grammys again you can't expect them to be good you can't get upset if they don't nominate the best records of the year because they'd never do that. You have to go all

in on the comedic value of the Grammys. It has to the only enjoyment of the Grammys is ironic from if you're looking at it from like a quality music point of view so really you have to cheer for like the most perverse choices to win in every year.

Yeah. For me, it's, you know, I don't respect the Grammys, but I love them if only because, you know, we're in a world where everything seems so chalk and algorithmic. It's the kind of dumb nominations of the Grammys can only come from human beings. I mean, by the way, Black Pumas are actually nominated for Best Boxed or Special Limited Edition package for an album that came out in 2019. I think, like, there's, like, all these categories towards the end that I think just mostly exist so they can give, like, Black Pumas and Beck and her the nominations that they somehow

get every single year. Um, yeah, I think that the Grammy, like, you just have to root for the Grame's to be just as stupid as humanly possible. Otherwise, like, it's, you know, it's like, what kind of sucker shit is that to be like, hey, the Grammys need to do better and, you know, nominate whatever indie fave you have. Well, you know, that's people in the music critic salt minds looking for things, I think, if you're going to do that. Black Pumas, I feel like they put out an album in 2019 and they just keep re-releasing it in different editions. And it always just gets nominated again.

It's a great scam. It's going to be 2030 and it'll be like the 11th anniversary edition of this album. get another Grammy nomination. Like they never have to put out another record. It'll just be repackaging that one record. And the Grammy people will be like, I was looking for an excuse to nominate this again.

I love it. And they'll do it. It is one of the great Grammy grifts, I think, I've ever seen. And I think they put out like a live album as well. Like it's just going to be alternating between like repackaging of the live album and repackaging of the blue. of the Black Puma's self-titled.

They crack the code. There needs to be a Beck and Black Puma's record. Maybe like Beck Pumas would be the name of that record. That would be the ultimate Grammy Bate of all time. We should talk quick about the Ticketmaster controversy this week with Taylor Swift. In our outline, you put Harry Stiles, too. Was there a Harry Stiles thing? I didn't hear about that.

The Taylor Swift fans come. complaining about going, because she has this big tour coming up of stadiums, and apparently the site broke because of all of the demand. I assume that there was also that issue that we've seen with other big tours where Ticketmaster does, I forget the exact term, it's like flex pricing. Dynamic pricing. What a, what a great Orwellian name for that. You know, I understand dynamic in the sense that it's allowed to grow based on demand, but it also sounds like, this pricing is dynamic. It's fantastic.

And basically, it's just Ticketmaster gouging their own customers for really popular tickets. Was there a Harry Stiles thing, too, like with upset fans? I feel like he was thrown in there. Maybe it wasn't recent. He also did apparently get hit in the eye with the chicken nugget recently. so I think we'd be remiss not to mention that, but maybe that's the controversy. That, like, Taylor Swift fans can only get, like, the total nosebleeds. And, like, you need, like, a slingshot or some sort of crossbow type apparatus to hit her with a chicken nugget.

You know, that's been a thing lately where people are throwing shit on stage. I feel like there's been numerous stories. Like, there was a Steve Lacey thing where I think someone threw a phone at him. And then he broke the phone on stage and he might have left. Don't throw shit at stage, man. Who's doing this? Did, like, the pandemic just permanently, you know, stifle our ability to be in public? Do people just not know, like, where they are now?

So, like, they think they're watching television or they're looking at their screen and they don't realize that there's, like, a real person up there? It's very odd to me that you would pay money to see somebody and then throw something. at them. You should be permanently banned from concerts if you do that, in my opinion. Yeah, no dynamic pricing for you. You get the non-dynamic pricing. Do you think the Swifties are going to be the ones to topple Ticketmaster finally?

Like, are they going to complete the job that Pearl Jam started 30 years ago? Because I feel like if anyone could do that, it would be the Taylor Swift army. And there is this story. I took this from TMZ. Famous last words right there. Well, you know, they are a reliable source, especially if someone's died. But in any rate, Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Scermetti, that's a crazy name for an attorney general from Tennessee. I feel like that should be like Roscoe Kingfish or something.

Like that should be the name of the attorney general. That's a Louisiana Attorney General. That's true. I guess that would, like, what would Tennessee be? Like, Jerry Bluegrass. Like, that should be the name of the Tennessee. That's Kentucky. Oh, my God, Steve.

Well, that's Bluegrass State. What's Tennessee? Okay, how about? The Volunteer State. Okay. You know, it's like, I'll say. It's like Rocky Toplson or I don't, I don't fucking know. Like, let's not anger, let's not anger the Midwest slash south.

I'll say, the Sunbelt's very indie cast. I'll say William T. nudie suit. Okay. That's the name of the Attorney General from Tennessee. Anyway, the Attorney General there says, antitrust violations, quote, could be an issue for Ticketmaster. He's concerned the company lacks competition.

Oh, really? Really? Wow, no one's noticed that before. And with that, customers are left with sky high prices and a poor experience getting tickets. So, yeah, Tennessee Attorney General, digging into Ticketmaster now. Do we have any hope here, you think, that the Swifties will take this down? Or will, like, Ticketmaster do some sort of cosmetic change and wait for everyone to calm down and things will this proceed as normal?

Well, I saw that, like, you know, AOC was posting about it. And, I mean, like, how awesome is it that the Swifties are using their, you know, force for something good rather than, you know, like, doxing pitchfork writers for, like, giving an 8.0 review. I would say that I can't envision a future where anything magical happens. What I do anticipate is the possibility of you getting a second round of media coverage for your Pearl Jam book, because then they're going to bring you on as an expert on Taylor Swift finishing up Pearl Jam's work. That's what I hope. That's what I hope. I have been working that angle on the social media platforms.

The holiday season is approaching. So if you want to buy a book for yourself or your loved one, this would be a great time. Buy for your Taylor Swift loving sibling or young person in your life and teach them about the background of the ticket master struggle. I would love that. We'll see if that happens. Let's get to our mailbag segment here. Thank you all for writing in. It's always great to hear from our listeners.

You can hit us up at Indycast Mailbag at gmail.com. Our letter this week, it's timely here because we're coming up on year-end list season, and this letter is related to that. Do you want to read this one, Ian? Yeah, this is quite literally. The call is coming from inside the house. This is John from San Diego writing in. As list season comes to consume the media world around us,

I have a list question. My friend is the editor of a modest but list. long-tenured indie music blog that runs a top albums list every year. He always takes that as a moral and stylistic principle to not rank the albums. I can understand his reasons for doing so. He wants people to read the writer's blurbs, to give all the albums on his list an equal shot and to do something different from other outlets. But I can't help but wonder if casual indie music list readers might see an unranked list and gloss over it completely, especially if it's particularly wording from a somewhat lesser-known website. That said, with more and more outlets doing unranked lists,

such as Pitchfork's recent genre-oriented lists and uprocks in the album's list last year, and the depth of the death, death, of the Pazze and Jop poll, I wonder if I'm just behind the times. What do you guys think? Are unranked lists missing a chance at making a bigger editorial statement that might benefit the artist or isn't the opposite? And is my friend sacrificing potential readers or do people going out of their way to check these lists even care about the numbers?

How do you guys feel about the status of the year-end list in 2022? John from San Diego. Oh, right, San Diego. So I'm going to guess that his friend works for a blog that I like a lot called Aquarium Drunkert. Because I know that's based in Southern California. And they do a big list every year and it's unranked. It's a list I like a lot. I always learn about records that I missed throughout the year.

So I love checking out that list. Spoiler alert, my album and recommendation corner. I read about on Aquarium Drunkard, so I love that blog. I don't want to make a federal case out of this, because I honestly don't care if someone ranks their list or not. It's fine. I do think, though, that the very act of making a list is a form of ranking. Even if your list is unranked,

you're still cordoning off this group of records from all the other records that were released in a given year. So if the idea is, well, I don't want to rank art, or I don't want to turn art into a competition, those sort of like moralistic arguments that people make for not ranking things. I think that's kind of bullshit, in my opinion. As far as, you know, not ranking your list in order to get people to read the blurbs, I'm a little skeptical about that because the thing about ranking albums on a list

is that you are making an argument for, this number one album being the album of the year or these albums being the top 10 albums of the year and the blurbs are intended to make an argument for that like you are saying this is why I think this record was better than everything else that came out in a given year which in my mind makes it more likely that people are going to read the blurb not less because if you don't have the

ranking aspect you're kind of taking away the drama of a list, if that makes sense. You know, like, the reason why people want to scroll to the end of a rank list is because they want to know how the list ends. You know, they want to know what the climax is. Just like if you're reading a story, you want to know who the killer is at the end of the mystery. You know, like, in this case, I want to know who the, like, what the most killer record

of the year was. So I'm skeptical of that. I want to get your take on this. my feeling is that there's like maybe a subset of readers who appreciate it when you don't rank things but I think most people like it and they like it because it's something that they can get upset about like that's what is the fun thing about a list

a list that's ranked is just more debatable than a list that is just like a bunch of records that people liked so even if people complain about the list I think ranking it makes it more fun for readers? I don't know. What do you think about that? I oftentimes think that this speaks to like the fundamental

question of how critics see themselves versus how readers see music publications. And you know, I think readers meaning that like people who aren't necessarily music writers because you know, it is like I cannot recall the last time I saw

a unranked list that didn't accompany that with some sort of moralistic stance of like how music isn't. sports. And I think it kind of overlooks the way that a lot of people talk about movies and, you know, music and, you know, other forms of art, maybe not so much books, but just say, like, this is my favorite, you know, this, I like this better than this one. And I think that, you know, all ranked lists, I think try to, I think they tell a story about how a publication sees itself, you know, because just imagine seeing a, a, you know, because just imagine seeing a

you know, like a year-end list that doesn't rank things. And you see like Beyonce next to say like Black Country New Road, just an alphabetical order. You know, what does that tell you about like the way they see, you know, Beyonce's art and what it accomplishes versus like a really good indie rock record? So I don't think it's a cop out necessarily. But I think the reason people love to publish lists in the first place is what you, what you mention is that people love to art.

I mean, even if it is somewhat, you know, cynical to do that, any list is in some ways hierarchical, you know? And even, I mean, even the lists that are ranked are every ranked list I've ever written for or like had some sort of control over. Like, there's a little bit of number fudging. You know, it's not just like, here's a vote. Here's what the numbers, you know, put out. So, like, do it if you want to. But I don't think. that unranked list versus rank list, there's like a moral imperative to do unranked list. You know what I mean? Yeah, I mean, to me, it's like, if you do an unranked list,

like speaking to your point of like, well, music isn't like sports, because I've seen that argument being made too. But if you do an unranked list, it's sort of like saying, okay, all these teams make the playoffs, but we're not going to declare a winner, you know? So it's like having the NCAA tournament, we have 68 teams. And then that's the end. They're not going to play each other.

It's still a sports-like setup. You know, you're still, again, cordoning off these records and saying, we think that these are the best. You know, like, because if you didn't, if you really don't want to treat music like sports, then you wouldn't make any list at all. Right. You know, you, you know, and you wouldn't make any judgments at all either. You know, it would just be like, everything is great.

All expression is worthy. You know, we're not going to be the ones to decide, if this record is good or not. We're going to take our opinions out of it because we don't think art should be judged. I mean, that is the natural end point of that kind of argument. And again, if you don't want to do a rank list, that's fine.

But the moralistic justifications for it, I just find to be kind of full of shit a lot of the time. Just say that we don't really feel like deciding what the number one album is. I get that. I mean, look, I think it's bullshit. to make a list and be like, this is the 13th best record, and this is the 17th best record.

I mean, that's kind of a bullshit thing, too. I don't really know when I'm making a list. I feel like I know what my top five or six are. And then after that, it's about, well, what do I like a lot? What do I maybe want to give some exposure to that hasn't been talked about a lot? You know, things like that kind of get into play. But I don't know. Again, lists are fun.

Like, let's not overthink it. Let's not, you know, act like it's, you know, some sort of ethical lapse if you do one kind of list versus another. I think it's all worthwhile. And again, I think the point is to discover things that you've missed during the year. And that's always the most valuable thing to me looking out of the people's lists. I just like discovering things that were past my radar during the previous 12 months. and also knowing whether Black Country New Road really is better than Big Thief. So, yeah, I mean, these are things that keep me up at night.

Well, let's get to our main topics this week. We want to start with a sad story, but we're going to turn it into a story of discovery and celebration of a great band from Minnesota, where I currently live. you may have heard that Mimi Parker, who was the drummer and singer of the band Lowe, she passed away earlier this month on November 5th of ovarian cancer. She was 55 years old. We want to talk a little bit about Lowe and give recommendations to people that maybe aren't familiar with the band and just to suggest some records that you can check out because they have a big catalog. It's a very consistent catalog.

So this is a band that you're unfamiliar with. There's a lot of great music ahead for you to discover. You may remember that we talked about Lowe in 2021 when they put out what appears to be their last record, which is Hey What. And it was one of our favorite records of the year. Was it your number one album of 2021? It wasn't my number one,

but it was definitely top 10. And I wrote a piece for Uprocks last year exploring, you know, my relationship with that record. And, you know, I get like almost not predicting, but kind of pointing out like how the marriage between, you know, Alan Sparhawk and Mimi, Mimi Parker made the album like so resonant. And, you know, the fact that it's been those two evolving over the past 30 years, which makes, you know, it makes it one of the more sad indie rock deaths of recent times

because it's not just someone losing their musical partner but it's also their life partner and those two have just been inextricable from each other over the past 30 years so in addition to losing a great artist

you think about like the human angle of it and it's sad it's like beautiful and sad and you know just in a way like hey what was in general a view of two people who have been enduring through various phases of their life.

Yeah, I agree with everything you'd have said. I also put Hey, what, in my top 10. I think it was probably top five that year. Really great record. I reviewed it for Up Rocks, and I talked about the thing that you just mentioned, the marriage between Sparhawk and Parker and how on that album, you could really feel the strength of their union being communicated musically because their voices are so prominent on that record. You go into Lowe's discography and the harmonies between Sparhawk and Parker obviously are a major factor on all their records. But I feel like in that album in particular, you really hear them sing together in a way that to me makes that album like one of the great records about marriage that has come out in recent years.

You know, there's like a lot of records about heartbreak, a lot of records about infatuation. But like great records about like a long-term marriage, you know, partnership. You know, it doesn't necessarily have that romantic quality that you typically get in pop music. So to hear a record that really, not only celebrates that, but embodies it in a lot of ways. It's one of the things that makes that record special. And I think the voices, too, it just stood out on, hey, what, in comparison to the previous low record, which was double negative,

which, like, Hey, what was produced by B.J. Burton. And double negative is, like, one of the most, like, radical, like, late period records by a legacy band, where it really subsumes like this band's melodies and just pure noise. And it's a very deconstructed record. And I think it's a beautiful record. But again, it definitely showed that this was a band not resting on their laurels

as they were entering their 50s and they'd been around for like almost 30 years at that point. But on hey what, it kind of brought them back to like the voices. And it was like a good balance of like the noisy experimental aspects of double negative with the more, I think, human aspects of like their best work. It really is like I think one of the great, if it proves to be, I don't know if there's like an album maybe that they recorded before Mimi's death. Maybe we'll get another low record. I'm not sure what the status of that is.

But if that is the last low record, what a way to go out. I mean, that is like one of the great final records by any act. Yeah, I think that it's been so poignant to see, you know, low as a band that over, you know, their span of time has had these kind of ebbs and flows in terms of, you know, their relationship to the indie rock narrative as a whole. I mean, they've had like a couple of like heights and like maybe valleys, but there's never been a time where they've been, you know, seen as like a joke or like, you know, made fun. Like, everyone, like, has respected Lowe from the very beginning.

And I think that's, you know, another part of, like, why there was such an outpouring of, you know, like, an outpouring of love after, after Mimi Parker died. It's like, you know, even if they have released records, you know, which have been, maybe some of them, like, weren't particularly substantial or, like, I think of the ones between. drums and guns and double negative. Like I enjoyed them. They were, you know, a little pleasant, but like at no point was, at worst, you know, they were a band that maybe some people took for granted.

And then they'd made something like double negative or, you know, the Great Destroyer, you know, which is my favorite album of theirs. And the one, the first one I really discovered, they always seem to have great timing as far as just reconfiguring what you thought of, low. I mean, the Great Destroyer, I think that one, I want to focus on a bit because, you know,

with this band, I mean, we're going to talk about like late 90s indie rock and I think this is going to just show the difference between, you know, our relative ages. But like, Lo was a band that I knew existed, you know, during their early times. Like I could live in hope through things we lost in the fire. And, you know, when they put out the Great Destroyer, this was produced by Dave Friedman, a guy who had done at that point, you know, like the flaming lifts, Mercury Rev. And it was this really loud, uptempo, almost pop album that really divided Lowe's fan base. I remember, you know, it's their most negative pitchfork review. But it actually sent me back to Rediscover Band of that nature, like, you know, slow core, if you will.

And, yeah, it just proved like, wow, this band has evolved. You know, I think the evolution of the band up to the Great Destroyer in retrospect made it just as interesting, if not more so. Yeah, the Great Destroyer was the record that got Robert Plant into Lowe. And he ended up recovering at least one song from that record on one of his albums. And he was among the artists that paid tribute to Mimi Parker. when she passed away. Yeah, you make a good point about how low,

they had this kind of career where they would, it seemed like every seven or eight years at least, they would put out a record that would put them back on like the critical map and people would be talking about low and being excited about them. And then they would kind of go back to doing

what they were doing, putting out really good records, and then they would put out like another record that bubbled up. And they never went into a decline really or they never like you said made like an embarrassing record that made people rethink about you know like should we like this band or not even that record the Great Destroyer I think while it was polarizing for some people like you said I think it also got like a lot of people into the band and I think when you look back on it I don't think that there's anyone who like hates that record now

I mean maybe you know some people might put the 90s records above it or something but but it definitely has his fans. I love that record, too. I started listening to Lowe in the 90s. I remember hearing that record I could live in Hope in college. And Lowe was probably bigger maybe than they were in my college community than they were elsewhere. I went to college in O'Clair, which is in the neighborhood of Duluth. I mean, it's like about three and a half hours away.

but it's that upper Midwest, frosty, frigid kind of music. So low is a pretty big deal in the 90s where I grew up and was going to college. And I feel like that is still a really good entry point for people if you want to taste like the early slow core low. And I feel like it's still like a pretty influential period of the band. You know, you had low, you had Red House painters, you had American Music Club. Any other luminaries of Slow Corps that I'm missing from that? I'm sure there's many others, but those are like three of the big ones from that period. Yeah, it's interesting because like at the time, like I was in college, like I heard, like I was vaguely aware of like slow core existing and I was just like, why the fuck would I listen to something called that?

And, you know, I think about this interview I did that published today with Jeff Rosenstock and Laura Stevenson about Neil Young, they did a Neil Young cover EP. And Jeff was like, you know, at my age, like, if it didn't sound like biohazard, I'm not interested. But lo and behold, I did rediscover these bands, you know, at 24, 25. And it's like, oh, like, well, A, it's good. I didn't listen to those in college because I certainly didn't need any help, any help being like morose back then. But, you know, like, I wish someone told me that Jimmy Eat World's Table for Glass is the opening track of clarity. Like, that was their attempt at making a low song. You could totally hear it if you go in knowing that. You know, I kind of wish I knew that because I might have had a different view of low back then. Yeah, well, it's, and you can see them as they evolved that they weren't making like quantum leaps. And I think they really made the big quantum leap at the end of their career. but before that it was more sort of like minor variations where they started out again in this very

sort of slow core vein which by the way I mean if you go to Duluth in the wintertime it feels like how Lowe's music sounds like if you you know if you've been up and you've experienced winter and that's even colder than where I live in Minneapolis I mean just going three hours north it's that much more frigid. You're right on Lake Superior. If you go to that town, you understand why Lowe made the music that they made. But then you get to, like, 2001, and they put out things we lost in the fire. Would you say that's, like, the one, like, if you're going to start anywhere?

Like, I feel like that one's become kind of the, if you got to choose one low record, that's it. Yeah, I mean, I think that's the, like, the low-e-e-est. slow record, you know, like of their classic sound. It feels like that's a culmination on that record. And it's probably the most acclaimed. Like when Mimi Parker passed away, I feel like I saw the most songs from that record being shared by people. So if we're going to use that as a rubric of prominence or whatever, you know, I would say that's the one. It's interesting, though, because after that record, that's like when they start to move in more of like a rock direction.

You know, you have the Great Destroyer a few years after that, and then they put out drums and guns, which is another sort of like rocky record. Super interesting album. Yeah, and again, similar to how they

were working with B.J. Burton on these last couple low records, like, that was an album where they really embraced interesting production. Yeah, it's on it's on, on headphones, like sometimes they'll like pan all the drums or all the vocals, like hard left or hard right. Like it like the sort of stuff I don't hear unless like you're listening to like a 1963 Beatles album or something like that.

It sounds like completely, it's like one of the few records. It sounds completely different if you listen to it in your car say as opposed to headphones. But yeah, that was a drums and guns and great destroyers. like that's my like peak low fandom and then uh you know they completely reinvent themselves with you know double negative and hey what uh it's it's really tough to go wrong with any low record yeah i would say again if you're a newbie and you're looking for entry points i could live in hope the debut and things we lost in the fire two really strong looks at like early classic slow core low you have those two records in the mid-odd

A Great Destroyer and Drums and Guns where it's more rocky low. And then the latter career, just curveballs that are beautiful records, double negative, and hey what, you're going to want to listen to those records too. So that's six low records. Dig into those and then you're going to want to hear the rest. Great band. I guess I want to believe that there's like a low record in the can, maybe that they haven't put out yet. But if there's not, hey what, just a great way to end. Let's get to our other topic this week, which is the 25th anniversary of the Lonesome Cudder West by Modis Mouse, which is today, November 18th, 1997 is the date that record came out.

I did an oral history of the album this week. I talked to the band. I talked to the people, close associates of the band, the producers of the record, which was a really fun experience. and it really made me appreciate that album just revisiting it. I think it's the best Modest Mouse record. I think it's probably between that and the moon in Antarctica. I'm curious to hear where you lean on that. What really impressed me

upon just revisiting the record this time was how well those guys played together. That's a record mostly recorded live and there's great songs on that record, but the instrumental interplay between Isaac Brock, who's playing very wild guitar, and that rhythm section

of Jeremiah Green and Eric Judy, which I put up with any rhythm section in indie rock history. Jeremiah Green, we don't talk enough about how that guy is just a monster drummer, particularly on that record. You know, Phil Eck,

I interviewed him. Of course, very famous record producer, works with Built a Spill, band of horses, really like the architect of like that Pacific Northwest guitar-oriented indie music. He made a comment

that sounds a little old manish, but I think he's right where he talked about how back in the 90s, if you were in a band, you had to rehearse a lot, you had to play a lot because you didn't have the option

that you have now, where a band could just be one person recording everything themselves and making a record that way and then posting it on the internet and then you form a band in order to tour after the fact that old schoolness

of the album is something that really spoke to me when I revisited it. You could tell these guys played a lot of shitty shows and like fly-by-night venues and they just smoke in a way I don't hear a lot of bands even bands that I like a lot. They don't smoke like that

anymore I don't think. Or it's harder to find bands like that, I think. It's so interesting to like consider I guess in the scope of indie rock that band would be considered tight but when I first heard the Lonesome Crowded West this is maybe like the first

actual indie rock record that I owned. You know, I had, my brother had a couple pavement albums that I borrowed, and then I read about The Lonesome Crowded West. It was in some Rolling Stone list, probably an unranked one now that I think about it. But, you know, it sounded interesting, and like I had to go to some different record store to buy it. And what struck me, now I can understand what makes them type, but, like, compared to what

I was listening to at that time, such as, I don't know, like, smashing pumpkins or radio head. I'm like, this is like the rawest, loosest thing I've heard in my entire life. It's, it's abrasive. It's weird. Well, and like, especially Pumpkins, like, they didn't play live in the studio. I guess they did on melancholy a bit, but it's a different kind of thing. Like, yeah. Most of that was Billy Corrigan constructing it in a studio and it's great, but like, when I was listening to Modest Mouse, it almost made me think of like CCR because they just seem like because they groove really well. Like they have like they are a chugally band on that record.

And just like how CCR kind of has that downhome quality of like, oh, these guys just have played together forever. You know, and there's a, and it's like, it's not like they're the best musicians, but like they compliment each other perfectly. And like that kind of dynamic with a band I think is unique. And that's like what I was responding to, like listening to the record. Yeah, I think with modest mouse, like in, it kind of. similar to like CCR where you know they're from like northern california but like they kind of like

are canonically southern in a way modest mouse like it is you know they are like very much Pacific northwest band but there's something kind of chugally like down home about them and i think one of the most important parts about this record is how um it opened up people to a part of the country that perhaps they didn't think a hell of a lot about like all these stretches of like the Mountain Mountain Time Zone and the Pacific Northwest. And when I was first listening to it, that's really what it opened my eyes to. And I think so much of this album is resonant in terms of talking about like the change, like the changes that the internet's going to bring.

Like I love that line about like working real hard to make internet cash, which 25 years later still very relevant. Similarly like about like gentrification, you know, malls becoming our ghost towns. You know, I think as far as like whether it's the best modest mouse record, it's not my favorite. That would be the moon in Antarctica because that one came out when I was in college and it sounds a lot better when you're high to things that are, you know, somewhat related.

But I think that the moon and antarit, or sorry, the lonesome crowded West is the one that I think is more interesting to discuss as like a text in 2022. Right. Yeah, like for the reasons that you're talking about, like the themes of the record, like Isaac Brock was at the leading edge of that, probably because he was living in the Seattle area, you know, which at that time was like really like the tech bro hub. Of course, that ended up moving to Silicon Valley, but, you know, he could see, you know, the effects of urban sprawl and, and also, I mean, the thing that he, The other thing that makes him unique is that he wrote about poor people, which is not something you hear a whole lot of indie rock. You know, you don't hear a whole lot of like firsthand accounts of like the underbelly of America. You know, a song like Trailer Trash, for instance, or even like Cowboy Dan,

which, you know, Trailer Trash is this sort of wistful song and like Cowboy Dan is like this sinister song. You know, you get like the melancholy of being poor and then you also get the kind of like frightening aspect of, you know, like living in a community like that. When I was listening to this record, I was thinking like, wow, this has to be the best indie rock album of 1997. Like, I can't think of or I can't imagine there being a better indie rock album from that year. And then I did a search here. And let me see if I can interest you in some of these albums. And by the way, I'm just talking about indie rock.

Not talking about albums in general Because my favorite album of 1997 Is probably either okay computer Or Time Out of Mind And neither one of those are indie rock But those are like two of my favorite albums ever You know came out this year But in terms of indie rock

We have Dig Me Out Slater Kinney Is Spiritualized Ladies and gentlemen We're floating outer space? Is that indie rock? Or is that not? They got like a hundred piece orchestra on that one I'm gonna say like it's indie cast

but like not indie rock. We're not going to count that one, but that came out this year. Daft Punk homework came out this year. We could put that in Indy Rock, but it's in the bucket for 1997. Perfect from now on by Bill to Spill. I can hear the heart beating is won by Yola Tango. You have stereo labs, dots, and loops. We can't count this as indie rock, but the color and the shape by foo fighters.

It's a great record. You have the Mollas. by Wien. Half of Sunny Day real estate is on the color and the shave, so. Kind of counts. You have the Portis Head, self-titled record. You have In It for the Money by Supergrass. This is an insane year.

You know, I know we don't talk about, oh, this year is better than that one, or I guess we do talk about that, but, you know, it's hard to, like, maybe judge years versus other years because there's always good records in any year. but my God, if you made a top 10 list of like the best albums of 1997, it's like straight all-time classics. Also like Elliot Smith either or... Oh, that's right. I didn't mention that one.

Bright in the corners, by pavement. So now I'm not sure. Like what would be my number one. I think Lonesome Crowd West is in the mix. But yeah, like either or. I can hear the heart beating is one. Perfect from now on. It's like, I'll say the Lonesome Card of West for now is my favorite indie album of 97 because I just wrote about it.

But if I wrote about any of those other ones, that would probably be like my new favorite. You know, like those four to me are just unbelievable. Yeah, those are all like if you want to just if you met some, like someone who has never listened to indie rock before and they want to know, hey, what was indie rock in the 90s? You could hand them like any four of those. And like, you could, just in those records, you can kind of understand. But, you know, for me, it's like I would, I kind of have to be on brand and mention the fact that, like, also, nothing feels good came out that year. You know, you're not going to see that on peasant job or whatever. But, yeah, that came out, like, which is, if not the best emo Al never made, like, the most quintessential one.

Like, if you want to describe, like, Midwest emo, you hand them a copy of nothing feels good. Also, minerals, the power of failing. the best album to ever have Comic Sans on the front. Yeah, like just, I know that like we don't like to, you know, music isn't sports, but if you like indie rock, I mean, 1997 was just like an unimpeachable year. By the way, which five guided by voices albums came out that year? Well, Mad Gearwig came out that year. That's a great, that's a great guided by voices record.

I was just, we didn't mention the verb urban hymns, which is not an indie rock record. No, it is not. It is one of the great British rock records of the 90s. Yeah, you know, again, I hate, I don't ever want to be the old man who's like, well, music was better back then. But holy shit, 1997. We have not had a year like that in a long time, at least for indie rock. That is unbelievable. So, yeah, kids, after you listen to those low records, just like make a 1997 indie rock playlist.

It's unbelievable. We've now reached the part of our episode that we call Recommendation Corner where Ian and I talk about something that we're into this week. Ian, why don't you go first? Yeah, just so kind of going with the theme that, you know, old music is better than new music, and that's confirmed fact. Well, that and your end list. I think I'm at a point where, you know, the new release schedule is starting to slow down, so I have to go back and try to rediscover stuff that, like, I may have listened to once and thought, oh, hey, I like this, but never got back to for whatever reason.

And so I'm going to dig out a record which came out all the way the fuck back in March. It is a true to form, a Japanese emo band called Injury Tape. And this album's called Songs I Mail to Myself. I'm putting together a year-end feature, as I typically do about emo and just trying to scour through maybe not like the ones that may be from like, let's say, 10 to 4, you know, on the top 10 list. And this one didn't get a lot of attention, perhaps because, you know, it came out on an indie rock label in Japan. But this, I mean, this is real spirit of 97 type music.

It sounds like braid reincarnated. And, you know, but it's, it's with a lot of like, you know, modern de emo that, like, tries to replicate that. It's, you know, they get the sound right and they get the production, but there's no hooks. This one is really catchy. And it also sounds like they're a band that's like aspiring. to get signed to a bigger label. So I always love that. The name of the band is Injury Tate,

songs I mail to myself. You can find it on band camp. You can find it on, I think it's in all streaming platforms. That's another issue with a lot of emo music of this sort where it may only exist on band camp or YouTube and may not be fully available. But I think this one is on whichever streaming platform you prefer.

So like Ian, I am also going to recommend an album that came out earlier this year. And, you know, I've been listening to record. that I missed throughout the year because I'm in year-end list making mode, so I'm just trying to make sure I'm doing my due diligence. And this is a record that I read about on Aquarium Drunkard, which is a great blog, if you don't know it. And it's called A List of Sightings, and it's by a band called Guma, or it might be Guma, G-U-M-A. I'm not sure. But anyway, this record is really cool. It's a band led by an Austin singer-songwriter named T.J. Masters. And,

I've seen this album get compared to like Steely Dan and 70s soft rock, but I think a better reference point for this record is probably Jim Rourke, particularly the albums that he put out in the late 90s, in early 2000s, like Insignificance in Eureka, where he was really plugging into that like 70s vibe, but putting it through the lens of indie rock. I also get some like Cass McCombs vibes from this record too, but from those comparisons,

you could probably guess that this is just really well-crafted, really well-done, poppy indie rock songs. Again, there is that sort of 70s-leaning aspect to it, but the craftsmanship is just really good and very listenable. I've been listening to it all week. This is a record that might sneak into my list at some point because I don't feel like it's gotten really any play outside of that Aquarium Drunkard blog post. I haven't really seen much writing about it, but I think it deserves more of an audience.

it's a really good record. Again, a list of sightings. Band is Guma or Guma. G-U-M-A. Type in those letters into your streaming platform of choice. And check it out. I think it's a really good record. Yeah, I haven't heard of it either.

What if it's like when it's Juma or something like that? Could be Juma. Could be G-M-O. Maybe I've just misspelled it. But at any rate, G-U-M-A, type it into your streaming platform of always check out that record. We've now reached the end of our episode. Thank you so much for listening. We'll be back with more news and reviews and hashing out trends next week. And if you're looking for more music recommendations, sign up for the Indie Mix tape newsletter. You can go to

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