In some ways this review has a foregone conclusion. When Brent DiCrescenzo reviewed The Moon & Antarctica for Pitchfork in 2000, he awarded it a 9.8, nearly the highest rating possible and one that I second with only quibbling reservations. Four years later, Epic Records has re-released the album in an "expanded and remastered edition" that begs the question: Why?
More ambitious in sound, if not in theme, than any of its predecessors, The Moon & Antarctica revealed frontman Isaac Brock's emotional and existential doubts to be as desolate and tundraic as its two title geographies. Simultaneously far-out abstract and achingly personal, it was a complex, inquisitive record, yet for every question Brock asked, he discovered a confounding infinity of even more questions. From all these conundrums he fashioned a bleak, angry philosophy about God, life, death, and his own and others' dwindling self-worth.
Nothing has happened since the album's release to alter that view very dramatically, but in light of the 2000 election, September 11th, the "war" on terror, and The Passion of The Christ, The Moon & Antarctica has only deepened in meaning and relevance. It may be mere hindsight, but these 15 songs seem charged with vaguely political undercurrents of anti-corporate discomfort and antiglobalist isolation, particularly in songs like "A Different City", "Paper Thin Walls", and "Tiny Cities Made of Ashes". How do you secure your own identity, Brock wonders, when everything you buy, watch, listen to, or experience already defines you to others? How do you find a space that hasn't already been branded with a logo? Or, in his own words: "Does anybody know a way that a body could get away?" The moon and Antarctica appear to be the last pure, untouched places within reach that can offer genuine isolation-- even though there's been an American flag planted on lunar soil for about 35 years now.
In light of this new relevance, the band's decision to license "Gravity Rides Everything" to a Nissan Quest commercial seems like a case of can't-beat-'em-join-'em. Perhaps it's an act of infiltration (do lyrics like, "As fruit drops, flesh it sags," and, "When we die, some sink and some lay" really sell minivans?). Or maybe the band just needed the money to pay the rent. Does it really matter? Only in the sense that this commercial is most likely the impetus behind this reissue.
But why re-release a new version of an album that's only four years old? Has it been remastered and expanded enough to warrant the $12 price tag? Well, for starters, the artwork is different. The reissue has a new arctic-blue and orange motif highlighted with machine blueprints (reminiscent of 1999's Building Nothing Out of Something), satellite photography, and a cover image that resembles a corroded hipbone. While I applaud the band for jettisoning the original shaking-hands cover art, which was silly in an early-80s Pink Floyd way, the new packaging-- the design of which was again overseen by Mary Maurer-- looks too abstract, muted, and minimalist, with no new liner notes, documentary photographs, or much of anything to bolster the product.
More important than the new visuals, the sound of The Moon & Antarctica has been reworked, and while I doubt there have been any great strides in audio technology that would render the original primitive, there is a noticeable difference between the two versions. The new one puts more texture in Brock's guitars, more layers in his vocals; Jeremiah Green's drums are a little higher in the mix, with a lot more high-hat ride. Overall, the sound is sharper and much more dynamic-- The Moon & Antarctica is now a headphones album.
And finally, there are the four bonus tracks-- a curious move, as the last thing this 15-strong LP needed was more material. Regardless, the set gives us BBC radio 1 session versions of three album cuts and an instrumental version of a track from 1996's This Is a Long Drive for Someone With Nothing to Think About. The live-in-the-studio approach doesn't add much to "3rd Planet", more or less a note-for-note re-creation of the original (save the bleeped-out "f--kin' people over"), but "Perfect Disguise" adds a watery effect to Brock's vocals and turns the song into a darker, if less lonely-sounding, dirge. Only "Tiny Cities Made of Ashes" sounds markedly different, and that's mostly due to Brock forgetting the words and laughing into his microphone.
But why such paltry offerings? Why not a second disc of outtakes, remixes, demos, and live tracks? Certainly, there's a wealth of material floating around from these sessions: the Everywhere and His Nasty Parlour Tricks EP contains seven non-album tracks (including the beautiful "Night on the Sun") and an extended "I Came as a Rat". Or why not include the upcoming tour-only bootleg Baron von Bullshit Rides Again? On the surface, this near-deluxe edition of a still-mindblowing album should be a godsend to Modest Mouse fans, but no one was really asking for it, and there's simply not enough here to justify the expense or even a rating as high as the original. Truly, the fact that this edition raises so many uneasy questions is the sort of cosmic joke that Brock and his bandmates can really appreciate.
