The year two-thousand reminds me a lot of 1990. Various dance pop groups and a style of mainstream that has completely stangnated. Most of my interest with rock music has been waiting for the next Radiohead album. In spite of this I try to keeb tabs on the "indie-rock" culture, and pick up an occassional album I really enjoy. After seeing a couple of really favorable reviews of The Moon and Anarctica I decided to pick it up when released. My first impression was that it was very good but now it has become one of very few rock albums in the past five years which have earned near non-stop rotation in my CD player. Modest Mouse is one of a very selective group to successfully blend all of the streams for rock's leanings into post-modernism. Basically its clear to that this album stems from the indie scene but has grown to be a bit more well-rounded. There's a lot of Pixies pop-punk present but also a lot of Radiohead or Pink Floyd spaciness. A lot of the lyrics (which are brilliantly nonsensical) even have some kind of space theme going. Producer Brian Deck has done a magnificent job giving the songs an extremely detailed and dense sound while retaining the raw, bleeding, amateurish sound of the band. In the end what makes the album is a strong group of diverse sounding songs that are seamlessly brought together for a nice cohesive listen. Many of the songs feature delicate echoey guitar lines, while others are impressively visceral punk outings. Thrown in occassionally are odd supporting instruments like banjo or violin. The songs are complicated enough to take a bit of getting used to but hold on up for obsessive listening. Modest Mouse are all still in their early to mid-twenties and have substantial room to polish and complete their sound. Given that Moon and Antarctica is a near-masterpiece and my early pick for album of the year. Time to go check out the rest of their catalogue. Highly recommended for those who looking for freshness in their rock.