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Modest Mouse
One evening at Denver's Bluebird Theater, where Modest Mouse was playing on a bill with fellow Northwesterners Built to Spill, Graham broke a second-floor window and stole into the backstage area. As Modest Mouse came off stage, he was excitedly waiting for them, blood streaming from cuts on his arms and face that he'd received from stray shards of glass. Chanting "This'll do it" under his breath, Graham introduced himself to the source of his enlightenment.
Here again the facts become obscured. While each band member remembers Graham saying "This'll do it" repeatedly, they disagree on how he referred to him-self. According to Brock, he introduced himself as "Ugly Casanova." Green remembers Graham saying "I'm Isaac," and Judy remembers "I'm Ed." Perhaps the only deciding factor would have been tour companion Chris Majerus, who had run off to get towels and bandages for Graham's wounds.
Though Graham was obviously unbalanced—or because of the fact—Brock, Judy and Majerus all took an immediate liking to him. In an enchanted tribute to Graham, Modest Mouse began to use Ugly Casanova as their publishing name. The three even persuaded a few labels to release limited-edition 7-inch singles of the songs Graham had sent them. But after briefly visiting each label in the summer of '98 to deliver his efforts, he disappeared and has not been seen since.
A year later, in the summer of 1999, the labels received belated thank-you notes from Edgar Graham in envelopes that had neither postmarks nor return addresses. At the same time, Isaac Brock received a sheaf of letters which profiled the running mental state of Graham/Casanova. Like the others, these letters had no indication of when they had been written or delivered, except one which had been dated a week earlier. The first fifteen pages were filled with nonsensical rants indicating that Graham had lost all touch with reality. The remaining 13 pages contained 13 songs about Graham's life and his barren home, his hopes and his delusions.
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Artist Biography - Modest Mouse
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 The lyrics and music were practically illegible, but over the next few weeks Modest Mouse tried to make sense of them. Starting from Graham's scratchy messages, the band began to assemble their new album. Due to that illegibility, the resulting collection of songs have become more an illustration of Modest Mouse's own musical and lyrical style than of Ugly Casanova's submissions. But the spirit of the album is believed to be that which Graham/Casanova had meant to convey. The Moon and Antarctica is the name of the album.
Drawing from influences such as Pavement, the Pixies, and Talking Heads, the Issaquah, Washington, USA-based art-punk unit Modest Mouse initially featured Isaac Brock (vocals/guitar), Dann Gallucci (guitar), Eric Judy (bass) and Jeremiah Green (drums). Formed in 1992, the band rehearsed and recorded demos for nearly two years, before signing with local indie label K Records and issuing several singles. Modest Mouse quickly set themselves apart from their indie rock peers by indulging at times with songs that stretched anywhere from five to ten minutes. Independent label, Up, signed the band next (with Gallucci having now departed), and issued inaugural full-length recordings such as 1996's This Is A Long Drive For Someone With Nothing To Think About and 1997's Lonesome Crowded West.
After returning to the K label for The Fruit That Ate Itself (the same year as their sophomore outing), Modest Mouse shocked the indie underground by signing on with the major label conglomerate Sony, who issued the trio's fourth release, The Moon & Antarctica, in 2000. The same year, a 12-track compilation album of early singles was released, and then a few months later K Records released the band's "lost" 1994 debut, Sad Sappy Sucker.
In 2002, Brock released an acclaimed album under the Ugly Casanova moniker. Benjamin Weikel replaced Green in the Modest Mouse line-up later in the year, but fans of this endearing band had to wait until 2004 for a new album. Former guitarist Dann Gallucci also returned to the line-up on the excellent Good News For People Who Love Bad News. Appealing to the band's fans and the critics, the album broke into the upper regions of the Billboard 200.
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For more information , enjoy the official homepage of Modest Mouse
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