The Lonesome Crowded Wiltern with Modest Mouse

Modest Mouse performing at the Wiltern Theatre, LA by Shelby Pfau

WA HEROES PLAYED ALBUM IN ITS ENTIRETY FOR 25TH ANNIVERSARY

Few bands have been able to maintain a legacy like Modest Mouse. Since their inception, Modest Mouse has damn near set the standard for the Northwest sonic landscape while tastefully and delicately evolving with every album. If I hadn’t ever looked into it, I would have assumed the band started Sub Pop themselves with their melancholy twang so radiant of Washington. Their second to last record before signing with a major label, The Lonesome Crowded West is a true indie icon by every definition, offering a yearning rage for anyone to find solace in; and they do. 

Despite the lack of snow in California, Modest Mouse brought winter to me. The minute “Teeth Like God’s Shoeshine” began, it tore through my subconscious and demanded attention. I immediately felt as though I was back in my midwest hometown of Denver, trudging through the snow on a poorly lit road at midnight with snowflakes stacking up on my eyelashes; experiencing a certain kind of romanticized bleakness that only comes with the experience of enduring frigid cities with nothing but a lit cigarette to offer a semblance of warmth. To put it simply, Modest Mouse eagerly fills the gap between rationale and utter apathy leaving listeners with something to ponder; an introspective gnaw against the baggage we all entered the Wiltern with. It’s an icy, tender kind of honesty loaded with raw, unleashed angst that’s nothing less than visceral. Albeit a predictable setlist for a show that promised a full play of the 15-track LP, it couldn’t have been more mighty.

Modest Mouse performing at the Wiltern Theatre, LA by Shelby Pfau

As we got deeper into the record, the atmosphere remained suspended; the vibrancy of the audience was transcendent. The album is relatively energetic throughout, and while the movement of the crowd reflected that with a thrashy jaunt, it was abundantly clear that the entire headcount was making a tremendous effort to ensure that every nanosecond of this show could adequately seep through their pores; as though we were all floating on through a mass sonic baptism. Through performance, an entire theatre was re-living a beloved past-life that this album holds close. To unshackle a time capsule for 1,850 strangers in a room together is surely a feat, but one that Modest Mouse couldn’t be more well-suited for. Airy moments throughout songs like “Cowboy Dan” or “Trailer Trash” extended a brief embrace before frontman Isaac Brock snapped us back to reality with his signature grit, as songs accelerated like a roller coaster creeping to great heights before pummeling into the uncharted.

The Lonesome Crowded West means a plethora of things to everyone, but it would be foolish not to acknowledge how remarkable it is that this tour has granted us the opportunity to replicate the album title in its most literal sense by showing up to a crowded venue on the West coast, standing jointly in our own collective isolation to celebrate an album alone, together; creating the lonesome, crowded Wiltern. To encounter this album as a recording is one thing, but to experience the wholeness of it in the presence of a performer like Brock is to allow him to lead a graceful, calculated dance between longing for more and reveling in the joy of what’s right now. Check out the setlist here!

PS: Check out our gallery of photos from the performance!

PS: Check out our gallery of photos from the performance!