Modest Mouse, 'We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank' (Epic)

Rock's crankiest optimists look for hope beyond the darkness.

Longtime Modest Mouse fans -- a ragtag assemblage of college-rock lifers, jam-band nodders, and ahead-of-the-curve cool dads -- were likely taken aback by the success of 2004's 1.5 million-selling Good News for People Who Love Bad News. Here was a band whose lead singer, Isaac Brock, paired his serene guitar lines with a jarring, from-the-spleen growl.

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