Right off the bat, “Cowboy Dan” sets the thematic tone of 1997‰’s The Lonesome Crowded West perfectly. It sounds western, it sounds like open skies, it sounds fragile and pretty, but it also sounds menacing and dark.

The song‰’s title character is easily one of the best portraits Isaac Brock has painted, and he‰’s got some masterpieces in his repertoire. Cowboy Dan is an impossibly angry, constantly drunk, over-rugged, violent cross between cowboy and trailer trash redneck. The personality‰’s so perfect in its details that my friends (well, maybe just Jesse) and I have described various aggressive drunks who ultimately undermine their impotent intimidation with simultaneous stupidity as Cowboy Dans.

While the character himself may be an inbred with an inferiority complex, Brock‰’s lyrics allow him to become a larger-than-life literary symbol. Who else but Isaac Brock can take the monolith that is Moby Dick and reduce it to two lines, all while keeping the character squarely in his own environment? “He drove to the desert, fired his rifle in the sky / And says, ‰God, if I have to die, you will have to die!‰’ ‰” Who else can summarize their thesis of both album, and partially, of the band themselves in another two? “I didn‰’t move to the city, the city moved to me / And I want out desperately.‰”

Only equal to the artisanship of the lyrics is the band‰’s music itself. Despite opening modestly enough, all of the band‰’s aggression comes pouring out after Brock begins shouting as if someone was stabbing him in the midst of delivering his lyrics. These outbursts are by no means random, and Brock chooses crucial lines like “I got mine but I want more,‰” and “Can‰’t do it, not even if sober‰” for most emotional punch.

Where alcohol is the catalyst to Dan‰’s rage, Brock is the catalyst to Modest Mouse‰’s. But in classic Mouse (and Pixies, and Pile, and‰Û_ you get the point) fashion, just as the chords get so hefty and distorted that they seem to fall apart at the seams, out of the wreckage emerges a gorgeous interlude.

This section still has that open space and snarling quality to it, but returns to a state of innocence. It‰’s almost like a daydream (or hallucinated oasis) of simpler times for Dan and Isaac, who describes “Standing in the tall grass / Thinking nothing.‰”

Depressing reality comes sneaking in again as the guitar moves to a prettier and sadder phrasing: “Every time you think you‰’re walking, you‰’re just moving the ground / Every time you think you‰’re talking, you‰’re just moving your mouth / Every time you think you‰’re looking, you‰’re just‰Û_ looking‰Û_ down.‰” The opening guitar melody returns, at first quietly, but at this point, we‰’ve got the intuition to tell that it isn‰’t gonna last.

As he loves to do in so many of his songs, Brock rips us from peace with one syllable shouted with all his force. Here, he goes for “WELL!‰” Everyone sounds angrier, louder, and generally more dangerous before things reach a boiling point. Jeremiah Green‰’s cymbals are explosive, Brock‰’s notes begin to blur from sheer volume as Eric Judy‰’s bass grimaces along with the irresistible groove.

Finally, everything comes to a quiet and we‰’re left thinking Isaac‰’s favorite phrase: goddamn.

Watch a live performance of “Cowboy Dan” below: