Earlier this year, we noted that Modest Mouse had returned to the studio to work on new material. This week, frontman Issac Brock finally told the world what Modest Mouse is working on…

“My big priority is to finish up this Modest Mouse EP,” he reports, adding that tunes like “The Whale Song,” “Satellite Skin” and a track with the Dirty Dozen Brass Band (”The horns are frickin’ rad!”) are all repolished outtakes from MM’s last two discs…

Finally, Brock told us that he and Johnny Marr will start writing new tunes in March and that in the spring, MM will hit the road with R.E.M. Says Brock, “I’m not really good at taking it easy.”

[Rolling Stone]

Aren’t they already releasing a b-sides compilation this year as well? And touring with R.E.M. and the National in June? Looks like it will be a busy year ahead…

Brock had previously talked about the future EP in an interview with VH1 last April.

We’re going to make an EP –- a partner record for [We Were Dead]. They’re really good songs, a couple of my favorite songs didn’t make it to the record, but they’ll be coming out when we have a chance to get them together. Not a clue when that’ll be. There’s one called “Autumn Beds” that’s about some of the characters that are recurring on this record, the people who worked on the fishing boat -— it’s about their trial and them getting killed again. There’s one called “Tie the Lake Down,” and there’s another called “The Whale Song,” which is a lot of people in the band’s favorite song.

[VH1]

In that same interview, Brock also talked about possible plans involving Heath Ledger…

We started working on some lower budget videos for seven or eight other songs. Heath Ledger’s been wanting to do a video for one of the songs that didn’t make it on the record, “King Rat.” Terry Gilliam is going to help animate it. Heath and I have a mutual friend and when we were in Australia, my fiancé and some of us in the band went out on a boat with him and his family and friends and talked about the idea. He’s got a video production company and was interested in working on something. We were talking back and forth for a while. The idea seemed sort of dropped, but then he just sent me an email saying that he wanted to do it. And I love me some Terry Gilliam. I hope it works out and I don’t sound like a f*cking liar at the end of this.

[VH1]

Another example of the immense and diverse talents of Ledger…

Check Out:
“Interstate 8″

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Tags: Modest Mouse