83: Modest Mouse - Dashboard

What would the music industry be like if it had a transfer market like the football world? Would the Sun be plastered with headlines about rumours of a surprise £20m move for Liam Gallagher to The Saturdays? Would Green Day and U2 get involved in a bidding war to secure the services of Lily Allen on a long term contract? Luckily, we need wonder no more, and that's because, not content with being an integral member of one of the most popular British bands of all time, Johnny Marr has recently decided to embark on a sort of job-hopping that we might expect from a journeyman striker. He's currently a member of The Cribs, but his career revival began in the summer of 2006, when he started recording with Seattle indie stars, Modest Mouse.

'Dashboard' was his debut with the group, the first single from their gold-certified 'We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank' album, released to much fanfare in early 2007. The band had been swirling around the indie underground for over a decade, and had even achieved some mainstream success with 'Float On' off their previous album, but the "signing" of Marr was the equivalent of Bolton Wanderers signing Jay Jay Okocha and Ivan Campo in August 2002. World-renowned stars in the twilight of their careers don't sign for unfancied clubs very often, and Marr's arrival was a coup for Modest Mouse.



This is an unusual song, to my ears at least, because of the lack of any semblance of structure. There aren't really any verses or choruses. It just rumbles along, at a consistent, reasonably rapid pace. In many ways, it's unexceptional, and I did briefly question my inclusion of 'Dashboard' in this list. But then I asked myself the following question: "Will I still enjoy listening to this song ten years from now?" The answer was a resounding "yes", which is why 'Dashboard' keeps its place as my 83rd favourite song of the past 10 years.