_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Sunday, May 11, 2008

The Man With Teeth Like God's Shoeshine

Sitting inside on this very rainy evening, I found a good video of Modest Mouse performing "The Man With Teeth Like God's Shoeshine."


This might be my favorite song of theirs. The lyrics are raw in a way that their last couple albums aren't, and Isaac Brock delivers them like he means it. I hear, among other things, a comment on consumerism...the marketing "man with teeth like God's shoeshine" who "[takes] 'em all for the sense of happiness that comes from hurting deep down inside."
Oh! If you could compact your conscience
Oh! And you might.
Oh! If you could bottle and sell it you might have done
Oh! And you might.
Oh! If you could compact your conscience
and sell it, save it for another time
you know you might have to use it."


I'm off to Dayton tomorrow for work...thankfully, a member of our team has already scouted places to eat on previous trips, so I may avoid spending an entire week at Applebee's.

4 comments:

Matthew said...

I think I agree with you about this song being one of their best. Since watching the video a couple days ago, I've had the song running through my head pretty constantly. I've also been wanting an Orange Julius for quite some time now - do any malls still sell them? That's one of the tastiest symbols of suburban consumerism.

Teague said...

The only bummer about the video is that they cut the song short and don't play the very dramatic ending with a few seconds of silence followed by three snare hits and a squall of guitar and yelled lyrics.

Orange Juliuses can still be had at the Dairy Queen store in the Towson, MD mall, near Baltimore. (They're owned by DQ, which I have previously noted does not make me hostile in the same way that other chains do.)

Teague said...

Well, I guess it's clear where I cut and pasted that HTML from...here's the link I meant to add.

lj said...

I think every mall in MN I've been in has an Orange Julius (often combined with a DQ). Come to think of it, though, I don't think I've ever had one.