Modest Mouse - "King Rat"

This track first appeared exclusively on a 7" vinyl promo opposite "Fire it Up" from Modest Mouse's newest album, We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank. The promo was given to individuals who pre-ordered the new album through online retailers. It now also appears on the UK version of the "Dashboard" CD single, released yesterday. In an April interview, MM frontman Isaac Brock explained the tune will eventually be included on an upcoming EP featuring songs that did not make it onto the new album. If that doesn't satiate your desire for info about this song, Brock also stated that actor Heath Ledger has signed up to create a video for the tune with Monty Python animator Terry Gilliam. A vinyl rip of "King Rat" was posted on a few blogs in late March, right around the release date of We Were Dead, but the CD conversion of the song sounds quite a bit cleaner and is available for your streaming pleasure below.

The song sounds closer to the band's Good News... material than the newest album, largely due to the drunken horn parts which introduce the tune and reappear intermittently. A simple, catchy banjo lick shapes the intro but gives way to a similar-sounding guitar part during the verses. "King Rat" revisits the new album's nautical theme-- most explicitly with the ominous repeating of "deep water, deep water" during the song's darker second half. While the quality of this B-side is surprisingly strong, it was probably still wise to keep this one off the already (in many ways) overstuffed We Were Dead. As the album is 14 tracks and an hour long, another five-and-a-half minute tune would have certainly been excessive. This song would truly shine in the live setting, as the second half seems tailor-made for one of Isaac's near psychotic freak-outs. Let's hope the other material from the forthcoming EP all sounds this good.

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