Search - Ugly Casanova :: Sharpen Your Teeth

A lost mind man's dream

apollo hay | az, chandler | 08/25/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"i think few people know that this isnt really an modest mouse album under a sir-name. yes the lead singer from modest mouse is the person who sings the songs but they were really written by someone else but Brock did have to improvise on some the songwriting due to the fact of the fan who wrote was some what crazy... im here to show you the story be hind ugly casanova and one of modest mouse's best albums moon and antartica, here's the story...

MODEST MOUSE

A Story by James Stockstill



Based on nothing in particular, someone decided to tell a story. The myths seemed to become realities and the facts were deeply buried. So this might be the time to reinvest in the story an appropriate amount of truth.



It all started in a place so barren that even the newly fallen snow, so fresh and hopeful, knew to leave once it met the wind. It's where Edgar Graham was born and it's where he grew up. Since life in his home-town truly consisted only of what he made it, he would take a guitar, sit outside, and listen to himself and the moon. He did this in body or in spirit every night for ten years until, at the age of fifteen, he joined the wind and the snow and left his home.



Four years later, Edgar found himself in Laramie, Wyoming. He walked the streets of Laramie day in and day out, singing to himself those same songs with which he'd grown up. At nights he sat in the downtown clubs and listened to whoever passed through. It was on such a night that he first saw Modest Mouse, then on one of the first of their many national tours. This was in 1996, right after the Up Records release of Modest Mouse's first album: This Is A Long Drive For Someone With Nothing To Think About.



The Issaquah, WA trio of guitarist Isaac Brock, bassist Eric Judy and drummer Jeremiah Green had formed in stages beginning in 1994 when they released a 7-inch on K Records. By early '96 they had released another two songs on Sub Pop Records and had agreed to do an album for Up Records. An image of the group had slowly begun to take shape, with conflicting scenes of bustling urban sprawl and naked rural isolation played out on their album covers and in their lyrics.



The songs of Modest Mouse spoke of travels to and from nowhere, with character sketches of the random lives that are unavoidable to those who have spent enough

hours searching for the meaning behind their own reality. These were the aspects that most touched Edgar Graham and which made him, as he wrote later, "ecstatic, but inconsolable."

What Graham heard had amazed him, but he felt that neither his own voice nor his own music could compare to what he had seen. He realized that, for all his years, his only critic had been the moon, who had always smiled at him. He decided that night to emulate Modest Mouse and took the name of Ugly Casanova. He began to collect Modest Mouse recordings, spending what money he had on the cassettes and records then in circulation.

After Graham had memorized the music and lyrics of one song, he'd move on to the next, through release after release. All the while he was purportedly shadowing Modest Mouse on their regional and national tours, although this allegation was neither acknowledged by Graham nor proven by others. However, there is still a question as to the identity of a certain fan who in late '96 and early '97 could be seen near the end of every Modest Mouse show, screaming and bouncing wildly around while they played their animated finale, "Tundra/Desert."

Over the next twenty months, Graham as Ugly Casanova made numerous home-recorded demos--inspired he said, by the demo recordings included on the Modest Mouse EP, Interstate 8. While the connection of submittal and acceptance is part of every nascent musician's ambitions, Graham's actions set him apart from most others. The voice on the tapes was eerily similar to that of Modest Mouse singer Isaac Brock. The music had the mournful quality of a disturbed and lonely man.

Graham's tapes sporadically appeared in the mailboxes of Up and Sub Pop Records in Seattle and of K Records in Olympia, all three of which had released Modest Mouse records. As other labels included Modest Mouse releases on their schedules, Graham's list of recipients grew.

After the release in 1997 of Modest Mouse's breakthrough album, The Lonesome

Crowded West, Graham embarked on an erratic tour of small venues in the Western states. Following as he did in the paths of his significantly more popular progenitors, rumors slowly began circulating that this Ugly Casanova, who played his shows in the dark and portrayed himself as characters from various Modest Mouse songs, was actually Isaac Brock himself. Graham/Casanova did nothing to dissuade these rumors. To the contrary, he reveled in them and on occasion, when asked his name, would peacefully reply "Isaac."

The irony of this period can only be seen in retrospect. It lies in the evidence suggesting that, day after day, Graham was turning more and more into the awkward representations of hidden American folklore upon whom the real Isaac Brock based his lyrics. The duality in much of Modest Mouse's music, between the natural and the unnatural, had begun to blur in Graham's mind much as human development had begun to blur the distinction between suburbia and nature. Graham was, in essence, becoming an incarnation rather than an imitation of those whom he obsessively admired. Yet to imitate or incarnate another's ideas without authority seemed wrong to Graham, and so he set out to meet the band.

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 himself. 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 enve-lopes 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.

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 a 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.

Themes of lost identity, spiritual betrayal, social and mental isolation, occasional self-loathing and questions to the origin, nature and intent of fate abound--as do the figurative portrayals of Graham's own past. The opening track, "Dark Center of the Universe," is an introduction to the frustration and social isolation felt by a man whose potential search for his own soul resulted in the adoption of all the facets of another's life. Consequently, the song stands as a realization of the fragility and futility of his situation. Yet the album does not simply dwell on a feeling of isolation, but reveals---just as did Edgar Graham's letters--the path and progress of his various transformations.

"The Cold Part" is the point of origin, the departure from a frigid physical surrounding and the hope for a change from all which fate has dwelt. "3rd Planet" traces the evolution of loss, as paranoia encroaches upon Graham's psyche and a distorted vision of creation ends up as a lack of self-identity.

While a sense of self-loathing is evident in the only set of lyrics Modest Mouse were able to recover ("I Came as a Rat"), Graham most often expressed a carefree nature in the face of obvious adversity. Always present behind "Paper Thin Walls," it was this side of him that Modest Mouse first saw in Denver, and the one by which he will hopefully be remembered.

With Edgar Graham's disappearance came feelings of personal betrayal on the part of one whose emergence had raised so many questions and concerns. Thus ended a melancholy existence, one ultimately led under the title of a "Perfect Disguise."





i think this is a album worth listening to but dont think youre getting a modest mouse album...think of it as getting an album of a band who really likes modest mouse....kind of like how modest mouse really likes the pixies... the reason i say that is because i think thats how it orginaly was suposed to be seen. if you end up listening to only a few tracks listen to "cat faces" it will change your life

"

Sadly, this will be the only Ugly Cassanova album

dresneer | Basking Ridge, NJ United States | 08/08/2002

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The story behind Sharpen Your Teeth is quite interesting. I've heard several different versions from various reviews and fanzines, so I'm going to do my best to be accurate. Ugly Cassanova was a roadie for Modest Mouse that wrote constantly. (In fact, you would notice his name in the writing credits of the "Whenever You See Fit" single.) Little was known about his background. Occasionally, he would record demos of his songs. Eventually, he just disappeared, so MM frontman Isaac Brock got together with members of Califone and Red Red Meat to record their interpretation of Ugly's songs as a way to hopefully find out what ever happened to him.The songs are simply gorgeous, and are best described as a cleaned up, more accessable Modest Mouse. The catchy riffs of Hotcha Girls, the twisted folk of Smoke Like Ribbons, and the sheer catchiness of Things I Don't Remember are arguably the best contributions to this stellar album.Any Modest Mouse fan, especially those who loved Moon and Antarctica, should take special notice of this album. Also, anyone who loved Modest Mouse and Califones' take on Slayer's "South of Heaven" on the I Love Metal comp may also want to give this album a listen. (In fact, MM should look into more projects with Califone, because this album and that cover prove they make a wonderfail team.)"

Sharpen Your Tastes

R. R. Oneil | Houston, TX United States | 07/17/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Modest Mouse is still better to me, but there is something about this album that makes me crazy. Isaac's voice with Jenkin's is a frighteningly melodic marriage. The music sounds totally psychotic, sad, sometimes alarming. The lyrics are like no one elses and constantly surprise me. How anyone could dislike such rich, full, and innovative noises, voices, and beats is beyond me. If you were bored at an Ugly Casanova show, you just shouldn't have been there, perhaps you weren't?One more thing, "Ice on the Sheets" is the best song I've heard in years. I urge everyone to listen to it over and over and over and over and over and over."