In the winter/spring of 2003 things were not going well for lead singer and guitarist Isaac Brock and his band Modest Mouse. Struggling to keep the band together, Brock was also struggling to write the material that would, with many delays, become the band’s hugely successful new album, Good New for People who Like Bad News. Engulfed in constantly shifting band drama, Brock and I talked on many different occasions, as it was unfolding, trying to setup a time for a more in-depth interview. I was finally able to connect with him on April’s day of fools and we talked for a long time about many things: how he was inspired by Prince, why he thinks Lou Reed’s “Walk on the Wild Side” is the greatest song ever written and how he copes with depression. But mainly we talked about the act of composing music, a process that through many attempts he was never able to fully explain. In the midst of all the turmoil, the notoriously press-adverse Brock was surprisingly happy and unusually candid in his assessment of his music.

T: It sounds a lot better than it does on the cell phone

I: I am sure.

T: The wonders of primitive technology I guess.

I: It is weird. The cell phones get picked up like, sort of like TVs. You know if your videotaping a TV and it doesn’t actually film right, you get all of those lines and shit. For some reason cell phones tend to do that.

T: I don’t know what the hell is going on there, but they definitely pick up all sorts of strange signals. So, let’s start this off on a positive note. What’s the difference collaborating on a side project like Ugly Casanova than with Modest Mouse in terms of the composition process?

I: Well you know…. can I think about that for a second?

T: Yeah

I: (Lighting a cigarette) Well for me it is easier just cause starting from scratch there is no set way that things have been done in the past or any of that jazz, none of the politics of regular band life. As time went on writing songs (with Modest Mouse), I had to give up more and more control so that everyone gets their fair chance. But collaborating on a side project and what not, when you start you are a lot less likely to get bickery with someone over things?less likely to slip into what was comfortable before. I worked with different people on the Ugly Casanova thing. And with Pall Jenkins (Black Heart Procession), I just kind of let him run the show and did my stuff after the fact because that was easier. That’s what felt natural, you know. And Brian (Deck) and I can come up with an idea, one of us tosses something out, the other one tosses something out, we work through it and come up with something great, sit on it, come back, and realize that we don’t like it at all and change it all.

T: So When you are working in that type of situation is it easier for new ideas and spontaneous things to happen because you are not as familiar with one and another?

I: Totally. (laughing) Yeah, there is not more to say than that, it really is that. Also, the Ugly Casanova thing wasn’t a project where I came there with fully written songs or anything you know. The project got built as we went, so it’s a lot easier to be open to ideas if you hadn’t written an entire song and know how you want it to go.

T: Can you hold on one second while I just double-check that this is actually working here. Before we go any further. Let’s start this again here.

I: Just to warn you up front friend, I am not really all that fast on my feet. Just not something that I have always been that good at. A lot of times I get flustered by questions because most of the time when people ask questions its something that I never really think about.

T: Well that’s fine. You can take as along as you want or if it’s a question that you don’t really want to answer or you don’t really have anything, we can just skip over it. Have you seen any noticeable change in your personal style of composition over the years from one album to another and at different stages in your career?

I: Yeah but it changes noticeably between songs is the difference. It really depends. I mean some times I actually do write a whole hell of a lot and I try to make sure that it doesn’t end up the same by being aware of that. No album needs too many of the same songs basically.

T: And when you say “same songs” are you talking about lyrical similarities or are you talking about arrangements?

I: No I am talking about arrangements. Lyrical(ly) I kind of think that it is cool if they tie together really well. But arrangement-wise and shit, it is good to change up. The tone and style of each song should vary a bit you know. It makes for a better story.

T: Do you often find that, say you’re in a period where you are writing a lot, will you write a lot of the same songs in the same key?

I: That would put me in a position of having to claim I knew how any of that shit worked. I’d like to. I used to be really proud and impressed with myself when I was younger that I could do all of this without having to explain all of that shit. And now I am just thinking why? I just want to know what fucking key this is. Other people in the band are having these fucking number or letter conversations. It’s A and I am just looking at the fingers.

T: So it’s much more of an organic process with you when you are sitting down to write songs?

I: Yeah. There is a certain amount of math that goes into it. Not math, but figuring out what needs to happen to make this song, any particular song, flow and not sit on the same thing for too long. Right now, I am trying to write a pop record. Not necessarily a pop record, but I want to for a change do a record that isn’t full of nine-minute long songs and shit.

T: So are you trying to keep all of your songs short on this album?

I: The majority. There is room for some not to be, but on the whole both me and Eric (Judy) really do want to try and do something different.

T: Does that make it more difficult to write songs under those tighter time constraints?

I: Not really. Actually it turned out to be a lot simpler at least in the lyric writing part. You know most of the songs I’ve just been trimming the fat: something’s running too long for me to feel that it is kind of stopping the groove in a weird way; if it is about to stop the groove by being too long. At the same time me and Eric started to write these songs that were kind of loping with no chorus and shit for a while that we put out a couple on this EP, what was it called, Everywhere and his Nasty Parlour Tricks. Kind of more acousticy and these songs that seemingly went nowhere. I really liked those too, as long as they do not last for fucking six minutes. It is a good thing.

T: When you normally sit down to write a song do you often have the lyrics first or do you often have melody first and then go back and put the lyrics on top of it?

I: A lot of the time, I will start with the guitar part, build off that and have some sort of singing, then I already have lyrics or things that are going on in my head that will match up with whatever rhythm is going on there.

T: A lot of times people will look into lyrics for some sort of idea of what is going on inside a musician’s head. Are your lyrics often pretty personal or more abstract?

I: No, usually pretty personal but then I try and dissolve off a lot of the “-me” angle and make it more available for everyone, make whatever is being said more usable rather than more self-centered. Know what I mean?

T: More universal kind of themes…

I: That’s what I meant.

T: Have you ever composed a song where you had one lyric of a song, a melody or a guitar part that became an entire other song?

I: Yeah, quite a few times. I can’t cite any specific things. No actually “The Stars are Projectors” was a song where I had that one line from another song. Shit-canned the song that it came form and turned that one line into that entire song. I really wish that there was some easy cohesive thing for me to say, that there was a fluid way that all this happens. But it doesn’t happen that way. I can go fucking months without even playing a song or anything and when I come back I don’t know how I wrote the ones before.

T: Are there certain environments that you find are better or more conducive to your writing?

I: I don’t like writing in those practice spaces, you know those rental ones and shit. Those are terrible for writing. I actually like being drunk in a kitchen. Then also a good shed situation or something where you are separated from anything else that is kind of distracting. I mean we had a good idea here with place we’re at right now. It’s a whole house and we’ve got this giant semi-truck-holding-size garage that I built a free-floating room in. And I really like writing out there, but it kind of was a failed experiment in so much that we have all of the distractions of home right there. It seemed like a good idea, but when you have all of that shit right there, it’s hard to stay focused.

T; What about when you are not writing with other people, do you try shut yourself off from the rest of the world? .

I: I need to. I can’t write when anyone’s around. I can’t write lyrics or sing for a song if I am playing with a band unless everyone is playing really, really fucking loud, so that I can basically get buried in it and know that they are not going to hear the shitty quivering crap. The things that aren’t really landed notes, just ideas getting thrown out. Or else just completely alone, I can’t even think that neighbors are going to hear or anything.

T: In a lot of your songs, cars come up a lot and the theme of driving. What is it about that?

I: It is not really cars per se or travel itself, except that for some reason it’s locked in my brain that a lot people can find humor or wisdom in all that shit. You know, biblical shit, even though you don’t believe in that stuff or whatever, or whatever the topic is? take trees or urban shit as examples of. What am I trying to say here? Basically it’s worked out as an analogy for a lot of different shit for me. You can take that activity and turn it into a whole bunch of different things that your mind does.

T: Do you ever write while driving?

I: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I used to a lot more, when I drove alone a lot more. But now I have my sidekick, I mean my girlfriend, and so it’s not like I take long drives by myself anymore. That and the fact that I do not have a license? got that one pulled.

T: But previously you did a lot of writing while driving?

I: Yeah it’s actually my favorite place to sing. On Ugly Casanova, if we had a song where we had the music going but there weren’t really that many lyrics yet, I would just make a disc of it and go drive around. I was living kind of in the middle of nowhere and I would just drive around the hills.

T: And listen to the music and get lyrics to put over it.

I: Sing along with it,l yeah, because I write my best lyrics when I am just brainstorming and singing, if I let it all come out. Actually it is the most fun I ever have spending time: when I am driving and just rattling on or when the music is loud enough and we are playing and I am rattling on.

T: Is there a certain time of day that is better for your writing?

I: No there is no certain time of day, it just depends on when I wake up. Actually, I write a lot of really good shit if I am drinking, but I don’t remember a damn word of it. Another failed way of doing things.

T: You are not one of those musicians who think you need to be sober when you write; you write whenever?

I: Yeah, I write whenever.

T: Is songwriting ever a cathartic experience for you?

I: Define cathartic

T: A comforting release from letting some of the things inside you out.

I: Yeah, oh totally dude. I wish I was a quote master. They’re out there, people who can say good shit.

T: That’s alright. I am not looking for the money shot quote or anything like that. I just wanted to get some idea of how you go about composing songs. It is all interesting.

I: Some of the (barely audible)“Lounge” songs that I’ve written in the past were written purely on the idea. Basically I made a movie in my head and I tried writing it as music.

T: For which songs?

I: There are a couple of songs that we have called “Lounge” and they’re all really long and kind of epic. But I wrote those in my head as a movie and then tried to write songs about them because I don’t know how to make movies, dude.

T: The song “Lounge” from your first album…

I: And also from our second album. They’re part of the same song actually I was just trying to write another one the other day, but it wasn’t quite there. I wrote a different song instead and used the same chords.

T: And it was all part of one idea you had in your head of a continuous movie?

I: Uh huh.

T: Interesting. A lot of writers tend to use stories that are told to them, do you ever do that?

I: yeah, yeah, yeah. Usually. Like (the song) “Cowboy Dan” is the name of a cranked-out guy who used to be a speed freak, a friend of my dad’s and I just liked the idea. And he is not a speed freak anymore for the record, but whatever when he was younger… I just liked the idea of someone named Cowboy Dan. Everyone actually referred to him as Cowboy Dan and then I just basically made fiction about this guy.

T: What about a song like “All Night Diner” where it sounds like a story that could have happened to you on the road? Is that fictional?

I: Half fiction, half not, you gotta spice shit up with more interesting stuff than what was there. God, I wrote that one because I had been listening to Prince and ended up writing that one.

T: Interesting. It’s fair to say that a lot of your songs deal with part fiction and part reality?

I: All of them. I mean let’s say anything that is a story is anywhere from 50% fact to 50% fiction. You’ve got to have experienced something in order to talk about it. Like that one about me being a prize fighter/ bull rider.

T: Which song was that?

I: It’s not a song it never happened, you know, it could. That would be fucking great—bull rider jousting.

T: (repeating the new sport while conjuring up the image) A bull rider jousting? Uh, that could work…

I: Maybe not, I guess you would have to have a bat of some sort because they are going to be flailing by each other.

T: I don’t know if you could stay on the bull long enough to actually joust.

I: Yeah that’s what I am beginning to think, right now.

T: You would probably have to find a more sedentary animal like a mule or something.

I: Right.

T: But then the mule probably wouldn’t move fast enough to joust.

I: Yeah, ok. I am writing, well not writing, but I am coming up with bad ideas for bad sitcoms and one is called Mork and Bindi, you know it is a spin off of Mork and Mindy obviously. Mork is an alien and Bindi is a fellow from India who wears the Bindi, but the thing is Mork and everybody from his planet naturally havr those, so he thinks that Bindi is another person from his planet and the hijinks happen after that guy!

T: ( Laughing) I don’t know if you are going to get that picked up Isaac.

I: Yeah, not now that we are in a pissing match with everyone I guess.

T: Pretty much the world at this point.

I: You’ve got ask yourself what’s going on when the only people willing to sidle up with you are Australia and Britain. Let’s see, they are all pretty much the same fucking family tree, they are all imperialistic. Well, Australia can’t really be imperialistic

T: They don’t have enough power to be, but they are a wannabe imperialistic country I guess.

I: They are willing to send fucking people to any war.

T: Just to get involved. The place where my family is from, Switzerland, has always remained diplomatically neutral.

I: Oh, but you’ve guys got a shifty past. Switzerland is everyone’s sweethearts because they were neutral during war, but the reason that they were neutral and were able to be neutral was because they were where the Nazis were banking all of their money. The Swiss knew what was up.

T: Greedy bastards.

I: That’s why they weren’t getting attacked or anything and didn’t have to make any of those sort of moves. They were the bank of the world at that point. I don’t know how clear is your conscience on that one? Not you, but…

T: My ancestors’ conscience. I don’t know. Maybe that’ s why they came to America.

I: And for hording all of the hostages… never mind.

T: What are the dynamics between lyrics and music and how they play off one and another in your songs.

I: What do you mean?

T: As far as when you are writing a song, and you have the lyrics and you have the music, how do the two work off of one and another as far as dictating what happens in the song? Is there one that sort of gets precedence over the other?

I: Well, ok. Let’s say we’re writing a song based on just playing music together, then the music itself will dictate what the theme is going to be and the same the other way around if I’ve got a song written and I’ve got the singing for it. Like the song I just wrote I wanted to have it really clear and open for every other line and then have all the drums and everything kick in for every other line: a buildup. They have to work together. I don’t know if any one dictates over the other. They have to make some sort of sense emotionally. With music you are trying to create an emotion for a story and you have to be able to make those work together. One of them can’t rule the roost entirely.

T: If you say that music has to create an emotion, do you ever think about your listeners when you are writing?

I: What do you mean?

T: Do you think about what emotion or what mood a certain song would evoke? Do you think about what you want to communicate with the listener or do you just want to get something down?

I: I suppose it is a bit of both. I want to get something that evokes an emotion in me and then at the same time sometimes they have to… let me not speak without thinking. That’s something that I do way too fucking much of. I write songs with whoever is listening to it and stuff in mind as well. This record in particular for instance that I am working on (Good News For People Who Like Bad News) which I know is hard for you to write about but I was really wanting to write something that was a lot more positive than some of the darker shit that I have written. I am not saying I want to write that god-awful R.E.M. song “Stand,” some sunshine candy fuck song. But there is a song that I heard by a band White Hassle. I don’t know if you know them.

T: I don’t know them.

I: White Hassle, they used to be Railroad Jerk but it’s a song called “Life is Still Sweet.” When I heard it, I thought that this feels really good to hear a song that is not fucking talking about sad days and yadda yadda, that is positive and gives a good feeling. I was trying to do that on this one but I end up with songs like “Please Bury Me With It” and “Satin in You Coffin.” I don’t know, best-laid plans man… (laughing) I’ve got a whole record about people dying and shit now with a positive slant.

T: Do you find that when you are recording an album you can go in with one intention, but as soon as you start recording the album the songs have lives of themselves?

I: Yeah I don’t think you can truly plan exactly what the vibe is going to be on something. I mean you can be feeling whatever the fuck that you are feeling when you are writing everything and that is going to play in quite a bit but from day to day. Like what season are you writing in, are you writing in two seasons? Cause I shit you not everyone in the fucking world is depressed form January through the middle of March.

T: That’s me.

I: Me too. Almost everyone I know. I hate that season. I even went to Mexico for part of one and I still hated it. It is just the sulky time of year.

T: Do you feel like you don’t want to write during those periods?

I: No, you write. Just don’t expect some smiley good vibes thing going on. Can I have you wait for one second—thirty of them?

T: We were talking about writing in different seasons…

I: Oh yeah anyone that cannot write an upbeat getting laid dance song in spring, I don’t know. People obviously write for how they are feeling and that all plays out to how a record is. I didn’t really want to record this record in the winter or be writing in the winter like I am. This is the only time in my life that I ever had to write a record based on the company’s schedule. I like the pressure to an extent but fuck me man, I kind of wanted to just be like, “there will be a record when there is a record.” But it has actually worked out really well barring my drummer going insane.

T: What is it like when you have a new member joining the band and you are trying to write songs in the process?

I: When you are coming out of… We had been feeling like we were walking on eggshells with our friend. I mean obviously, we have been playing with Jeremy [Green] since we were 14-years-old. And you know I hope that he is not out of the band forever, just this project. Get him perspective, get us all perspective and actually we are having a fucking blast. I kind of feel guilty about it. Because for one, we’ve got someone who is focused and who isn’t overly sensitive to whatever. We have options as to what we want to do because this person who is playing drums with us right now is just filling in on the record. And he is really good, but that means that we can bring in other friends and an actual percussionist, which is something that I’ve always wanted to do, but it’s a hard sell when the person who plays drums feels like they’re getting slighted. That’s something that I loved about Ugly Casanova because I got to make those sort of fucking decisions. Like end of the day collaboration or not, I got to make all of the decisions. That’s fun to an extent; it’s also fun to share the creative part of things, which I did in the collaboration. But I also got to make all the percussion decisions, which was great. I want us stomping on wood and I want chains, all the shit that I wish my friend had come up with.

T: With Modest Mouse do you feel that it is more collaborative than it was with Ugly Casanova?

I: Well it’s more collaborative than it was with other Modest Mouse records in the past because you figure out that certain things don’t work. Like I can’t be a control freak asshole. All of these people are putting in the same time and this is their lives too and shit and I can’t run the show like I am just running my show.

T: Is it difficult to let go of some of that control over a song when you have such a clear vision of it?

I: No because we can discuss shit pretty well. Sometimes, I will get pissy as fuck. There’s moments when someone’s changing the program and I will get in full-on huff mode. I won’t listen but I’ll play along. But I am pissed. Until it works out and I am like, “oh yeah, I’m a dick.” That was my impression of me. Um, um that was an um followed by nothing, I should just fill you in on that.

T: So when you are writing songs do you ever go back and listen to some of your favorite musicians while you are trying to write?

I: Yep. Always. Actually my favorite musicians are why I want to play music.

T: But for example if you are in a creative block how do you get over that? Do you do that by listening to other musicians?

I: No, not necessarily. I guess it could work. I guess that maybe I’ve tried it. I don’t know if I ever have or haven’t. Usually if I get in a creative block, I just kind of let it sit. The best thing to do is read actually. You can get more ideas from reading than you can from listening to music.

T: So do you often get a lot of ideas from books that you are reading?

I: Oh, hell yeah.

T: Have there been in books in particular?

I: Yeah. (A cell phone rings in the background.) Hold on a second, I have a friend who is supposed to call me. He is coming up from California. Hello, hello? (He answers the phone but nobody is there.) Jesus fucking Christ. I am going to let them call back.

I: Blood Meridian was one. A lot of the last record (The Moon and Antarctica) was a combination of my experiences and shit that I picked up from that. The vibe I got a lot from that.

T: Blood Meridian who is that by? I am not familiar with it.

I: Cormac McCarthy, the guy is a badass writer man.

T: I read a ton, but I’ve never read anything by Cormac McCarthy. But I am definitely familiar with the name. My parent’s own a bookstore.

I: Awesome man. You’ve probably done some reading.

T: Yeah. I have done my fair share of reading.

I: Probably some forced reading too.

T: Some what?

I: Forced reading

T: Pretty much. I didn’t have a choice growing up and went through that whole bullshit period of rebelling against reading.

I: Yeah, reading Us and People and shit.

T: Just not reading, pretty much and then it came full circle.

I: I go through that a lot too, but it is not rebelling it is just laziness.

T: Yeah that happens as well, it’s easy.

I: Yeah. I mean God, they made TV. The biggest distracting pain in the ass in the world, television, and I’d like to put it down but it’s always funny. If you’ve got cable there is almost always something funny on there.

T: Yeah it’s an easy distraction. I don’t have cable so that’s a good thing but…

I: I curse the day that I got cable.

T: With the album The Moon & Antarctica, was it different writing and recording an album for a major label?

I: No that time around, it was fucking the same plan as always. That’s also where I learned regardless of what you are getting as a band… There is a cut off point too if you are getting nothing then its going to be a lot harder to fucking work a deal. When we were independent and smaller and shit people would cut us a deal, the indie deal right, but when you are on a major label you don’t get cut any deal. But what people don’t realize is that we didn’t actually take the fucking major… We didn’t get the regular major lots of money thing, we got a decent recording budget but nothing compared… People that have never made record that do the same kind of music as us get that much money. I found that our money went away a lot quicker and we didn’t get that much more. That (The Moon & Antarctica) was actually the first record that I worked on with Brian Deck. Kind of a nightmare. I showed up at the studio and maybe it was the weirdest recording experience, no this is still the weirdest recording experience. But I showed up and they hadn’t even built the studio and I showed up. I was actually moving out in the process and I had driven out with all of my shit in my van and the studio is not even done so I am sleeping on this couch at this office. Then I start helping build the studio and my friend helps build it too and it wasn’t that good.

T: The studio wasn’t.

I: Uh huh. It was Clavis. The Califone folks studio now.

T: Yeah I know that band. I like those guys a lot. Their new album is really good.

I: I am hoping that one day they start to get some good recognition.

T: Yeah, they definitely deserve it.

I: Just enough to make their lives a bit easier for Christ’s sake. They’re so fucking good. Drop the Matchbox Twenty, drop whatever hideous fucking young punk band, Dashboard Confessional album. Put that shit down because you are going to do it in a year anyways. Pick up some Califone.

T: There’s no justice in this business, that’s for sure. On the album The Moon & Antarctica you first introduced the character Edgar Graham.

I: It was a fiction thing that I started a while back to eliminate myself from the band. I wanted to somehow work my way out of doing interviews ever. Cause I mean come on man, I am much better at making shit up and doing things than I am talking about it. And I am sorry but I feel like such an asshole after every interview because I feel like if I had thought about this I would have had something really good to say instead of just stuttering and saying um and things. So I wanted to eliminate myself from being a role in my band and shit, so I invented this fictitious character. The only reason that I am giving it away is because it is long since given away. But I invented it during the Moon & Antarctica and that’s when the bio came out and credited him with all of the songs basically.

T: And did it work at all for you?

I: A little bit, but then only in so much as then I had to explain it. Rather than it working, working like Marvin Pontiac [John Lurie’s alias], which I had no idea at the time was a fiction when I came up with my fiction.

T: I guess I want to talk a little bit more about the album that you are working on now. You mentioned that you were trying to write more pop songs…

I: Not pop, but just pop length.

T: Pop length songs.

I: Let’s scratch the pop thing because that is not necessarily what I am trying to do. What I am trying to do is to make a really focused album rather than a meandering album. I want this brief and to the point and I don’t want any of the songs to hang around too long.

T: By hang around too long, you mean you want what?

I: I want what goes on in them to happen to the point where you go back and want to listen to it again?to the point where everything that goes on happens kind of rapidly. And then obviously there will be longer songs and stuff but on the whole I want to try and make an album of shorter songs than I‘ve done.

T: I know you said that you wanted to try and record happier songs. Is there any other theme that is central to the new album?

I: Yeah. Death and possibilities I guess.

T: That seems that it goes over all of your albums, doesn’t it?

I: Yeah but this one a little more. I had a lot more friends die on this album.

T: Really. I am sorry to hear about that.

I: Yeah me too. Shit. But the point of my record is that life goes on really. No even life goes on but… give me second. You know there is this whole song about ‘maybe we’ll get lucky and we’ll both grow old, maybe we’ll get lucky and we’ll both live again, but I don’t think so.’ That sort of shit, a lot of that. Then there is “Satin in the Coffin” which is kind of dark and funny. Actually I just recently wrote the most rock song of my life.

T: Really

I: Is it going to cheese you out if I give you some of the lyrics?

T: No

I: It is called “Bury Me with it” (singing):

“We were shooting at a mound of dirt, well nothing got broken and nothing was hurt, but I probably really should have been at work. But if my free time is gone won’t you promise me this, won’t you please just bury me with it. As sure as planets come, planets end and if I am here when that happens promise me this, my friend, won’t you please just bury me with it. Cause I don’t need no Madmax bullshit.” But the most rock lyric on it is goes, “Fast it comes and fast as it goes and God I love that rock ‘n’ roll, so please just bury me with it.” That’s it, that’s the rock lyric. Sorry dude that was fucking tacky.

T: No, that works man. So what inspired that song?

I: New drummer, feeling good. I was actually in a good fucking mood. You know life right now for everyone is pretty fucking threatening, call it unemployment, call it environmental problems, call it all that shit. You know I was thinking about the whole Madmax thing where there are a lot of people who are wanting to duct tape their windows and find ways to survive the shit hitting the fan and the fact of the matter is if shit gets that bad, I don’t want any part of it. I had a good run, you know. The world is hard enough being a Wal-Mart, Pleasant Place, turn it into drinking shit water and worrying about way too much shit like that and I am willing to sign off. And no I don’t believe in the afterlife and no I don’t believe in reincarnation or any of that shit. Sounds good! But, not sure where I would go if there was an afterlife, it might not be a good deal for me either. You know what the Mormons say. Their whole thing on the afterlife is that there are three levels. Let me start off by saying fuck the Mormons, I don’t give a fuck who I offend, it is some freaky, creepy shit.

T: I have been to Salt Lake City it is some creepy shit.

I: Do you know much about that religion?

T: No.

I: It was founded by a murderer, a crazy man who was run out of town by everybody. Him and his crazy sidekick found these golden tablets. He found the Mormon’s bible written on these golden tablets, but only Joseph Smith, the murderer, could read this shit. He was the only one that could read them cause God had given him magic spectacles, right? So he reads these and transcribes them and apparently there are 12 of these… oh could they be apostles or whatever. 12 witnesses but he loses the golden tablets. No, I am sorry. Joseph, Mormania or the land of Mormon, how do you lose a bible’s worth of golden tablets? Do you leave them at the bar? Do they fall out of your wallet? What the fuck man? What kind of nonsense is that?

T: I have a lot of problems with religions in general they are built on a lot of…

I: Manipulation.

T: A lot of rhetoric, a lot of bullshit. They all have one purpose to unite and control. It is a scary…

I: I got my religion fix when I was pretty young, I was actually part of this weird cult church which was actually a branch off the same church that the Branch Dividian was off of. I was speaking in tongues and shit when I was a kid and all that jazz. I know for a fact that kids ain’t dumb, they may not know how to change a carburetor or rotate tires, but they know what’s up. I don’t think that there is any kid out there that is dumber than the person that they become when they are an adult.

T: I would agree with that. They might not be experienced, but they have a knowledge that doesn’t accompany you into adulthood.

I: I think that there is an openness to ideas and the knowing enough or not knowing enough to question what the fuck is going on. When I was involved in this speaking-in-tongues church, I remember when I was supposed to find my tongue all their deacons laid their hands on me and started speaking in tongues, that’s when the spirit of the Lord is supposed to come into me and I am supposed to find my tongue. I robbed lyrics from goddamn Mary Poppins. Lukididltle lungila Lukididtle lungila. And they just all kind of looked away.

T: Is that the only time that Mary Poppins has ever appeared in any of your lyrics?

I: Yep. We lived in this preacher’s basement. We were dirt ass poor. But we lived in this basement, but he was kind of way too creepy. What did he say? My sister came upstairs in here nightgown and he was like “oh kiddie porn.” And I think that is when we moved out of his house.

T: Yeah that sounds like a good time to leave.

I: He was an evil fuck. He died a while back. He was running for senator of Montana. When he died our whole family was so excited and I am sure we were not the only ones. He was one of the most evil people. So we moved out to this house, but we are getting most of our food donated in boxes and it quits showing up for quite a while and so my dad is up in the preacher’s office and he sees all of these boxes with Brock written on it. The only thing left in them is string beans, which the preacher didn’t like.

T: That sucks man.

I: So God was a hard sell for a long time.

T: Yeah I could see that but it seems like in a lot of songs you are dealing with heaven and hell, especially on The Moon & Antarctica.

I: That is because they are great fucking analogies, allegorical stories, great shit to work with. They are great concepts regardless of whether they are true or not that shit is going on in everyone’s head: the fear of light and dark, good and bad. There’s hardly anyone on the planet that we deal with that isn’t somehow controlled and built up by that shit. The bible is the premise for how a good deal of countries… even the bible or their Koran. But all these stories are how all of these countries base their morals so that’s open season. I mean come on, God is a great character.

T: Do you find that it’s questions that you can’t answer but it’s still a really good source for material?

I: Honestly, I figured out that was a big part of what The Moon & Antarctica was supposed to be about, but it didn’t end up being as much about. Was that I actually figured out how to answer the question of God and infinity and how you can have something be infinite and all that jazz. It is called limited infinity which is a sphere. Like the planet earth itself, which is infinite but limited, you can walk in any one direction as long as you would like barring the fact that you would drown running into the oceans. But you can walk infinitely.

T: But it is still limited space…

I: Limited space and basically there is no reason that space itself can exist without having something exist before it. Time itself is a sphere.

T: What do you mean by that?

I: I mean, who was it? I think it was Hawking, Stephen Hawking, maybe it was Einstein or someone like that, No it wasn’t Einstein. Someone was talking about how time itself actually changes and warps and I don’ know how you can take something abstract like time and warp it. Leave that to a physicist, but I like the idea. Light bends, everything fucking bends. What’s a bend? There is some point where our vision on everything that’s out there. Like even standing out in the yard the world looks flat as hell, but obviously make that a bigger scale and maybe you don’t see it. Everything does bend and stretch out. I don’t know I got in over my head on that one.

T: I could see how that could make for very interesting subject matter, thinking about those things as you are sitting down to write.

I: Totally toying with yourself, yeah and it is.

T: When you write song do you feel that it is constantly changing or when you write a song do you feel that you stick to the original pretty faithfully?

I: No never. No song is ever finished, you know. Uh, some of them. Some of them are because there is nowhere else to go with them. I used to be really big on the fact that just because something is recorded doesn’t mean that it is finished. It just means that that’s where you were when that was done. And our live shows reflect that. We play songs now completely different than they were on the record. They are longer or shorter, whatever some of them have entire new lyrics in them, verses that show up at will. For sure once you actually record something there is no reason to consistently do it different. Like sometimes it easier to just do it as it was. (Aside) Goddamn it she didn’t get beer. Hold on one second, (in the background) “hey sweetheart did you get beer at all?”

I: Hello? (dejected)

T: Do you have any song of yours that is a favorite?

I: Nah it comes and goes. I have moments where something I really, really like. Let’s see… I like “Heart Cooks Brain.”

T: Yeah I love that song. That is definitely one of my favorites.

I: Yeah I like that one a lot. I mean obviously I like a bunch and shit, it is kind of hard to narrow them down and decide. It is like trying to decide which one is your favorite kid.

T: What is the feeling like of actually finishing a song and getting it to the point where it is actually finished?

I: It fucking rules man. I wish I had better words, but I am a product of the times. I am never happier than when that happens.

T: There is no other feeling in the world like it?

I: Fuck no. Let me think what I am trying to say here. It is about as excited as I ever feel. The fact is that it is not a feeling that I get from finishing a song or writing my part of it or whatever. It’s once I have everybody playing on it and it becomes this whole different and huge animal, I am so excited that it worked out that way that I feel like handing out cigars.

T: It’s like a birth?

I: Yep.

T: What to you is the most perfect song ever written?

I: “Walk on the Wild Side” by Lou Reed.

T: What to you is perfect about that song?

I: Um, the steady calm and the beautiful, kind of evil, sexy groove to it all, you know? The story, somehow: “Walk on the Wild Side” is sad but somehow it’s not. Dark living and shit by folks but with a positive slant. Just the overall feeling. Just the whole thing. There is no one element of a song that will ever make a good song. You can have the best band in the world and you guys can be writing the most fucking amazing music ever made and if the singer fucks it up with clumsy lyrics, self-centered lyrics, crappy singing more often than not, irritating clichés, fucking poetry, or whatever you’re going to fuck up that beautiful song that was written by the band. So it all has to play, ‘cause I mean the same way around. You are more likely to do well with good lyrics and good singing with a shitty band than you are with a good band and shitty lyrics.

T: You feel that part is really important to the process?

I: It is the first thing that people really attach to. It is the only angle that is a person’s voice that you can attach a vibe to.

T: You talk about “Walk on the Wild Side” and it is pretty dark story but it has bright almost juxtaposed music.

I: That’s what I was saying there totally what could be, would be depressing stories with a fun feel and that’s just how so-and-so is living and I can fully relate.

T: It seems that you do that a lot on some of your songs as well; you put dark lyrics on a happy melody.

I: Yeah, it’s not based on that song, but maybe that’s why I like that song. You know you just get the flipside, get the whole fucking sphere built in there. What is it the Lennon song, Lennon/McCartney whatever, I don’t care who wrote that shit. I imagine it was Lennon. The song “I have to admit it’s getting better.” [“Hey Jude”] Totally happy good song; “it couldn’t get much worse,” that line. There you go, kind of sarcastic but positive at the same time.

T: Just the whole juxtaposition of the whole thing. I think that’s most of what I wanted to ask you man.

I: This sucks man. This is actually one of the only interviews that I have ever looked forward to doing and I feel like I fell flat on my fucking face.

T: Why man? I don’t think that you did at all.

I: It’s just overall, saying what I meant and being as articulate I would have liked to have been.

T: If you think of anything else I can do a follow-up. I definitely don’t think that you fell flat on your face. It’s hard being interviewed.

I: It’s not something that I signed up for when I started making music I will tell you that much.

T: A lot of times you see the interviews and what people ask the musicians has nothing to do with the actual fucking music.

I: The other thing is that I think that there might be a lot of people who understand how things happen for them and how music comes together and the songs come together and I find myself trying to answer questions for things that just happened for me. I probably should have read your questions that you sent to me, but I have not checked my e-mail in a couple of weeks probably about three weeks. (laughing)

T: I can relate because if somebody were to ask me, ‘Well, how do you write?’ Well I sit down and write a bunch of words on the page and then I start moving things up here and moving things over there.

I: I mean you toy with yourself, outside of what everyone says. I imagine, at least for me. I fuck around in my own head. I play little games where shit comes out, if I am trying to write and things. I don’t know what the fuck I am trying to say there either. Oh well.

T: There is no science to it, when you get down to it, it just sort of happens.

I: (Great One! Imitating the Crocodile Hunter) I have lived as a fucking recluse for the past three years. I was living in bumfuck Florida and in bumfuck, Oregon.

T: I think it is good to cut yourself off from society every now and then. I have definitely done that before when I lived in Mississippi. Just to get the fuck away from everything for a little bit

I: I like Mississippi.

T: Yeah it’s a great place, man. I lived down there in Oxford.

I: Oxford. Damn we were actually talking about recording the record there ‘cause we were going through, “ok is everyone fired?” What is going on? (Referring to the termination of the guy who signed the band to Epic.) We got this guy Dennis Herring that we are maybe going to work with. He is a good guy he has done everything from fucking Neil Diamond records to Sparklehorse.

T: Really? I love Sparklehorse.

I: Yeah, me too. That is why I chose the guy. I was just like, “you must be good and it.” Turns out he has done Counting Crowes but also good shit like Buddy Guy. What are you listening to man?

T: What have I been listening to lately, let’s see. I like this band called the Black Keys. Have you ever heard of them?

I: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I haven’t heard them, but I have heard of them. I’ve heard a lot of good shit about them actually.

T: Yeah they’re pretty good. They are kind of like the White Stripes but more raw and bluesy kind of thing. It literally sounds like someone just put the microphone in the corner of the room and just let these guys wail away. It sounds good though, they have some pretty interesting stuff. I have been listening to that new Califone album a lot.

I: Califone fucking rocks it. I was actually asked to join that band at one point and I asked them over and over again “are you sure that you want me to come out?” Because I know what they apparently didn’t: I don’t know keys and shit. This was four or five years ago and I moved out there. Finally they were a 100%, so I moved out there to join the band and things and I practiced with them once and ended up working at the truck stop that they own the rest of the time. (The opening track of Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot starts paying in the background) It was really fucked up because one of the guys, Phil from Orso, was playing bass for them at the time and he was the only one who wasn’t playing in open tuning or on pianos or whatever and I was trying to watch him and he would flat out turn his back to me and kind of look back like, “I know what I am doing.” And he admitted to doing it later. A) If you do that, play dumb. Don’t be my friend and nemesis at the same time. So they had a truck stop where it was just a weigh station and a meat truck cleaning thing. So I just cleaned out meat trucks with Loftus, who is now like my brother, my best friend and shit. I don’t know if you have heard the band Loftus, which is people from Red Red Meat, Califone and the Grifters.

T: Yeah, I’ve actually got that album with the skull on the cover.

I: Yeah, Loftus is my friend and him and I started working together and we have been sidekicks ever since. He, at one point, was living in my basement in a tent for a long time where he would sleep for about 48 hours and then wake up and we’d rent dramas, really depressing movies as comedies which is a really great way to deal with Februarys and shit like that because obviously it is downer time so rent the most depressing shit that you can and laugh at the sadder parts, laugh at the misery. And it fucking worked wonders.

T: I might have to try that because I have been looking for some way to cope for those whole three months and my method…

I: Do what you got to do. You’ve got to find what it is that is the problem. Everything makes you sad, everything is so dark and hopeless, well then rent movies or read books about that and laugh at the sadass shit. It makes you a bit eviler in some ways, but laugh at the misery. Like when there is death and everybody was teary, we would be busting up. So that was good, that is Loftus, the only man who casually talks into conversations “when Jimmy Carter came to my house.”

T: When what? Jimmy Carter? Like the president Jimmy Carter?

I: (speaking of Loftus) Yeah, he is something like a phenomenon. He won the bar The Empty Bottle in a pool game once right.

T: He what?

I: You know the bar in Chicago, The Empty Bottle? It is a bar where most bands like us and folks play. Where we used to play but now we don’t really play there that much but where most good bands play that come to town. Actually, when I was working at the meat truck place the owner Bruce let me have the entire apartment upstairs for a buck. He was giving it to me for free but I didn’t want to take that man. I was like, “I gotta pay you something,” so he’s like, “ok give me a dollar.” Anyways Loftus won the bar off Bruce in a pool game, but obviously wasn’t going to follow through because he didn’t want to deal with the accounting and shit, but there is a drink there named after him called the Yachtsman because everyone is always wondering what he does for a living and he is like, “I am Yachtsman.” And he’s got his own seat (at the bar).

T: Nice.

I: Yeah, actually I would like to not call this interview done. I would like to chat without the questions. Would you mind that?

T: No. We can do that.

I: Because I think that I would feel a lot better about shit if we could. Ok, the average amount of time it takes for someone to respond to anything that happens is something like 1.5 to 2 seconds (counting). Now that leaves a lot of room, not a bad amount of time, but I can’t do it. I’ve never known how to answer these questions as far as how shit gets done. I used to be just a smart ass and now I am kind of trying. It’s just not really where I am good at shit, you know? Call me an idiot savant, I don’t know. I can make the music, I can’t answer the fucking questions.

T: I think it is sort of hard to do that and I think that a lot of that has to do with the stupid questions that a lot of people ask.

I: Your questions weren’t stupid. They were just hard for me to answer because I am not sure how it happens myself. But Thursday night, why don’t we have a conversation where we just shoot the shit?

T: Alright, that works man.

I: And I’ll tell you bad stories and you’ll tell me bad stories and we’ll have that. It is just funner.

T: We can definitely do that.

I: Well, hey thanks a lot for your patience so far and all of that shit.

T: Well thanks a lot for taking the time to do this and seriously don’t sweat that you didn’t… It’s a process that is hard to describe and I think that if you could easily describe it, everybody would be out there doing it.

I: But I do it and I don’t even understand it. Well I do, I just don’t. Well I guess maybe if I had gone to school or something. I am not talking college, just maybe if I had gone to school.

T: Period, gone to school period.

I: I quit the beginning of high school and all that jazz. Apparently, I had really good lines. It was total rhetoric that I just borrowed from somewhere or another but sold it to my mom. Which was: “I am going drop out of high school and I’m going to move to D.C..” (Imitating his mom’s voice) “Well you need to…” “Mom school is getting in the way of my education.” I stole it from somewhere, but fuck, it worked then. But it doesn’t work now when I actually have to formulate sentences.

T: Don’t sweat it man and we can follow up on Thursday.

I: Cheers. I am going to drink a six-pack before you call because apparently being an alcoholic means that I can’t have real conversations until I am real tipsy.

T: Well, whatever elixir works for ya, gets you talking.

I: Alright man, I will talk to you Thursday. What time are we going to do this?

T: Well what time works for you around the same time?

I: Around 7 o’clock at night, cool?

T: Yep I will talk to you then. Thanks Isaac.