Last Night The Ocean Is the New White Belt
posted by on March 22 at 11:08 AM
On the way to Modest Mouse last night—Megan Seling, Jonathan Zwickel, Annie Wagner, and I went together—Zwickel said something about a British Columbian ski resort called Modest Moose. He said, “That’s actually where they got their name.”
Wagner, taking it seriously: “No, they got it from Dickens. I can’t remember which book.”
Zwickel: “I thought it was Virginia Woolf.”
Wagner, laughing: “No, it’s not Virginia Woolf. Would Modest Mouse name themselves after Virginia Woolf?”
The gynmasium at the South Lake Union Naval Reserve didn’t make anyone think of Dickens or Woolf, though if you’ve ever read Melville’s fattest book you might have thought of that. The doors to the gymnasium had round windows like portholes; some fish netting was hanging from the ceiling at the back of the room; behind the fish netting was an installation about the voyage of the Discovery, complete with a replica of the ship; there were lanterns on stage; and the blue lights shining into the stage fog looked like sunlight does when you’re under the ocean. Oh, and the new album is called We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank. “Nice to see you all in this big, boxy boathouse thing,” Isaac Brock told the crowd.
The Shins went ocean-themed for their last album too. As Seling said, “Ocean is the new white belt. It’s the new trend.”
Islands were way ahead of the pack on this one, then.
Islands were way ahead of the pack on this one, then.
Um, so were The Decemberists, then, with "Mariner's Revenge Song" and "A Cautionary Tale."
Megan is totally right. The other night my friend was telling me about the new MM video and how Isaac is dressed like Skipper from Gilligan's Island. I said, "Yeah, they're really pushing this whole nautical thing." (Obviously, Seling's much more clever than I am.)
By the way, JZ was right.
Woolf's "The Mark on the Wall", from Monday or Tuesday: "I wish I could hit upon a pleasant track of thought, a track indirectly reflecting credit upon myself, for those are the pleasantest thoughts, and very frequent even in the minds of modest mouse–coloured people, who believe genuinely that they dislike to hear their own praises."
ho snap! the music editor knows what hes talking about! thats a first.
Decemberists? Come on, now; have you forgotten the 90s? Rachel's, Shipping News, June of '44, and so on? For some reason indie rock and the ocean have been tied together for many years.
ben affleck was in the voyage of the mimi.
"Sublime" by The Ocean Blue is a good song.
Um hello? Slint? "Good Morning, Captain"? 1991.
Uh, Beach Boys? "Sloop John B," 1966.
Hey geniuses, we live right next to the ocean. Chances are a lot of our bands are going to write shit about it.
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