release date: Apr. 6, 2004
format: cd
[album rate: 4 / 5] [4,08]
producer: Dennis Herring
label: Epic Records - nationality: USA
Tracklist: 1. "Horn Intro" - 2. "The World at Large" (4,5 / 5) (live) - 3. "Float On" (4,5 / 5) (live) - 4. "Ocean Breathes Salty" (4 / 5) - 5. "Dig Your Grave" - 6. "Bury Me With It" (4 / 5) - 7. "Dance Hall" (3,5 / 5) - 8. "Bukowski" - 9. "This Devil's Workday" - 10. "The View" - 11. "Satin in a Coffin" - 12. "Interlude (Milo)" - 13. "Blame It on the Tetons" (4 / 5) - 14. "Black Cadillacs" - 15. "One Chance" - 16. "The Good Times Are Killing Me"
4th studio album by Modest Mouse is released nearly 4 years after the band's first studio album on Epic Records and it sees the band's growth from a trio to a quintet. In 2002 the band was expanded with guitarist Dann Gallucci (who played additional guitar parts on 'The Lonesome Crowded West') and multi-instrumentalist Tom Peloso joined in 2003, whereas drummer Jeremiah Green was temporarily absent due to a nervous breakdown from 2003-04 and is replaced by Benjamin Weikel on this album.
Good News... is a different album with respect to the band's former albums. It's still alt. rock and indie pop for people with a sense of humor, and for people who require that music sometimes is different from traditional mainstream pop / rock but it's a much more uptempo and positive collection of songs, although, moodiness still plays a major part.
This was actually the first album I heard with the band. I believe the Danish national radio program P3 played the song "Float On" a few hundred times that year, and I for one really loved it. It made me search for and listen to the band's older albums but without being poor or mediocre none of those come really close to this, I think, although The Lonesome Crowded West from 1997 with its apparent musical inspiration from Pixies with a noise rock, alt. rock style albeit less punk rock-minded tone and with a stress on a story-telling mission may be regarded as a blue-print to this.
I simply love to hear and watch the band perform live. You can really hear them try to play and sing out of tune to make that special twist to the overall picture, which is a nice garage rock and authentic sound. The album was nominated Best Alternative Album at the 2005 Grammy Awards, and it's a good place to start if you don't know this band. I also recommend We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank (2007), which is very much in style with this specific album. This is really nice ... with a twist :-)
This album is highly recommendable.
[ allmusic.com 4,5 / 5, Mojo, Q Magazine, Rolling Stone 4 / 5 stars ]
