Modest Mouse did not record those 5 songs with the Japanese Tour EP in mind.
At all. What those 5 songs are were demos recorded for Epic last January.
Record labels, when deciding whether or not to sign a band, will sometimes
give them some money to record a few tracks - this way the AR guy can bring
the songs to the executives at a record label and show them kind of the
direction a band is currently going. MM recorded the songs in a couple of
days with Phil Ek. I think they sound great - just a bit stripped down and
a little compressed. They're demos - not final versions. When you hear the
versions that make the final album you'll see that they probably have a lot
more atmosphere and the like. Obviously the demos were good enough for
Epic. My guess is that MM got permission from Epic to make a certain
quantity of EPs when they went to Japan last year. When a record is
released in Japan it is usually much more expensive than buying an import of
the same album - that is why a lot of Japanese albums have bonus tracks and
the like. It gives people living in Japan more of an incentive to buy the
domestic Japanese version of the album instead of a much cheaper import.
Hope this clears up things a little bit.
Ryan
