[.ca] Sad Sappy Sucker

From Amazon.com:
After stepping up to the major-label plate with The Moon and Antarctica, Modest Mouse reach back to their roots with Sad Sappy Sucker. Sucker is actually the band's first recording, released in 2001 but created back in 1994. It was shelved in favor of Lonesome Crowded West as their debut, but Sucker is still a fine piece of the Modest Mouse lineage. Although parts of Sucker are experimental compared to the band's current polish, this isn't some rarity to be enjoyed only by collectors. Breezy melodies build into jagged choruses as singer Isaac Brock shows he can be both tender and playfully aggressive. Most of the songs clock in between two and three minutes, leaving room for numerous gems in the course of the 24-track album. While 12 of the songs come from a recording session with K Records' Calvin Johnson, a chunk of Sucker material comes from Brock's "Dial-a-Song" phase, during which callers heard new songs by dialing into his answering machine. These experiments range from lo-fi combos of distorted instruments and whiny vocals to complete songs, like the bluesy rock jam on "Secret Agent X-9." The Dial-a-Songs--and a message left by Murder City Devils front man Spencer Moody ("Call to Dial-a-Song")--are both comic relief and proof that Modest Mouse didn't gain their indie-rock cult status by accident. The talent's been there from the beginning. --Jennifer Maerz

True fan, still a bad album:
Its great to see that an album can in fact be recorded using nothing but crappy equiptment, but for christ sake, keep it in a vault, far far far far away from a cd store shelf near me. Lo-fi is one thing, this falls under the category crap-fi.

The Fi lays low:
A tremendous Modest Mouse fan was I, forever, until the legacy was ended by the putrid Moon and Antarctica. I've seen them many times and own a large amount of their material, and the era of The Mouse represented by "Sad Sappy Sucker" is still my favorite. In my opinion there is no Modest Mouse better than early Modest Mouse. The "bad" recordings, relatively structureless songs, and irreverence is what made them who they are (were?). "Long Drive" and everything before it, I would say is unparalleled when put against any other Modest Mouse material. That album and this one easily take the cake as my favorites. "Building Nothing" is nice, too.

Sad it is:
The title of this album fits it very well. Modest Mouse should have just kept it mysteriously floating around the net. Get the Moon and Antarctica instead.

Representing Cleveland Ohio:
It is sad to see this album get such bad reviews. I can only say one thing, if your a true modest mouse fan then you will like sad sappy like any other mouse albums. Yes it is a little raw but hey what do you expect, it is a lot of their early stuff that ya, probably was recorded in a basement or a shed. The second half of the album are songs recorded in the early days, on their answer machine for people to call in and listen to. You must remember who modest mouse really is. Not a mtv pop band but teachings from the divine right. If you are wary of this album which I was at first, listen to it again, and if you still don't like it as much as the others listen to it again, and then once more all the way through. After that if you still don't like it their is no hope for you.

Primordial:
"Sad Sappy Sucker" is not Modest Mouse's best work ("Lonesome Crowded West" is), but neither is it trash. In fact, it serves as a fantastic left book-end to the group's career thus far. Granted, the production even on the best tunes is awful, the answering-machine ditties are largely annoying, but still, this record gives the listener a chance to hear one of rock's greatest bands in its infancy, and the experience is a most rewarding one. Themes both musical and lyrical that Modest Mouse will later give definitive treatment to are first explored on "Sad Sappy Sucker", and this is reason enough to buy and enjoy it.

• Worms Vs. Birds
• Four Fingered Fisherman
• Wagon Ride Return
• Classy Plastic Lumber
• From Point A to Point B
• Path of Least Resistance
• It Always Rains on a Picnic
• Dukes Up
• Think Long
• Every Penny Fedcat
• Mice Eat Cheese
• Race Car Grin You Ain't No Landmark
• Red Hand Case
• Secret Angent X-9
• Blue Cadet-3, Do You Connect?
• Call to Dial a Song
• 5-4-3-2-1 Lipsoff
• Woodgrain
• BMX Crash
• Sucker Betru
• Black Blood and Old Newagers
• Swy
• Austral Opithecus
• Singunchaser