Strangers to Ourselves - Modest Mouse

Make a great album! And that’s exactly what Modest Mouse did with "Strangers to Ourselves".

In case you missed its 2015 release or are looking for good new music before the holiday madness arrives, check out "Strangers to Ourselves."

A casual purveyor of this Issaquah, Washington band, I liked "Float On" and "Dashboard" enough. I even legally procured both songs. Might just be timing, or maybe I’ve matured enough to truly appreciate their harmonious reverberations. But there’s a joyous, deliberately moody natural flow to “Strangers to Ourselves” that keeps your ears and soul wanting more.

Maybe it's just me, but there’s something a little special about albums whose title songs start or end the album. It creates a holistic album completeness when that title phrase is used on another track at the opposite end.

Strangers to Ourselves appropriately kicks off with "Strangers to Ourselves" and the phrase “strangers to ourselves” delights us close to the tail end of the album in the song “The Tortoise and the Tourist.” "Lampshades on Fire," the first studio release off the album is second and my primary motivator for buying into the genius of the album. In addition to the aforementioned, my personal favorites are Pistol (A. Cunanan, Miami, FL. 1996), Coyotes, and "The Ground Walks with Time in a Box."  Other songs like "Pups to Dust" and "Be Brave" are cool, just a case of “to each their own.”

With each listen, I transform more and more to a fanatic. Each song an obsession that needs to be felt live. Definitely not a Stranger to this album (I can’t resist a pun).