Modest Mouse: We Were Dead Before the Ship 2LP Vinyl

Why you'll love it

This 2LP set spreads the album over four sides of 180g vinyl in a gatefold jacket. It debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 128,585 copies in its first week, topped the chart in Canada too, and went gold in both countries.

This edition

2LP set
180g vinyl
Gatefold jacket
Pressed in the EU

About the album

When a band hires the guitarist from The Smiths, they're not planning a quiet one. Johnny Marr came to Portland to help Isaac Brock write a few songs, hit it off straight away and ended up a full member of Modest Mouse, with founding drummer Jeremiah Green back behind the kit and Joe Plummer joining on percussion. They recorded again with Dennis Herring at Sweet Tea Studio in Oxford, Mississippi, and the album came out soaked in salt water; Brock first imagined it as a concept record about a ship's crew.

"Dashboard" is a swaggering lead single, "March Into the Sea" kicks off with plenty of bluster, and The Shins' James Mercer adds harmonies to "Missed the Boat," "We've Got Everything" and "Florida." "Fire It Up," "Little Motel" and "People as Places as People" show the band's gentler side, and Marr co-wrote songs and toured the record with them.

By 2015 it had sold 649,000 copies in the US, and it stands as Marr's one full album with the band and the last with founding bassist Eric Judy. Brock summed it up as a "nautical balalaika carnival romp," which is a better description than anything we've managed in years of trying.

Also at Kops: more Modest Mouse on vinyl · browse Alternative