Johnny Marr and Modest Mouse have revealed they’ve started working on new music together, which would be their first since Marr’s stint in the band from 2006-2008.
Both Marr and Modest Mouse frontman Isaac Brock were asked about the prospect of reuniting in a new feature with Spin, celebrating the 15th anniversary of 2007’s We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank.
“We’ve already started working on some stuff together,” Brock said. “We just finished a song, ‘Rivers of Rivers’ – actually I think it’s just ‘Rivers of…’ – but it’s in a pen-pal sort of way. International travel isn’t what it once was at the moment.”
Marr added: “I played on that new Modest Mouse song, and there are a couple of other things knocking around that Isaac’s writing. As Isaac said, air travel isn’t quite what it was. But hopefully when the world tilts back on its axis, I’ll be jumping on a plane, I think.”
The two have spoken in the past about the prospect of reuniting. Last year Marr responded to Brock’s claim that “the option’s available” for him to rejoin the band by calling his tenure with the US indie cult heroes “the best time of his life”, and hailed Brock as “the greatest living lyricist he’s ever worked with”.
The ex-Smiths guitarist left Modest Mouse in 2008 and went on to play with The Cribs from 2008 until 2011.
Last month, Marr’s two former bands announced a tour of North America together. Marr responded to the tour announcement on Twitter, calling the news “killer”.
Meanwhile, Modest Mouse have also announced details of three special UK headline shows that they’ll play in July.
The band will tour this summer in support of their seventh album The Golden Casket, which was released in June 2021.