MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI! MOGWAI!
That's more or less what my review of Mogwai's Come on Die Young might have looked like at the time. Readers would probably not have learned a lot form it –apart from the fact that I thought the album was absolutely fantastic–, but after the succulent Young Team, it was nothing less than their magnus opus. Their wall of sound was interlaced with brilliant samples and arrangements, which resulted in an album that seized you from the first to the last note and dragged you away on an intense listening trip which only occasionally exploded. The CD was so full of restrained tension and emotions that it seemed about to burst. It is beyond doubt one of my all time favourites and it made me a Mogwai-fan for life.
Fortunately, they didn't let me down after that, as their next two albums, Happy songs for happy people and Rock Action, were again filled with goosebump moments. And now, ten years after Young Team, they released Mr. Beast. The music on this record reverts a little more to the roots, which results in a number of songs, e.g. Glasgow Mega Snake, on which they really let it rip. Concertgoers, be warned: as a result of this, their live concerts will undoubtedly again contain a number of ear-splitting moments that can only be survived by using a pair of industrial earplugs...
Mr Beast contains all the ingredients that make Mogway such a great band, but in smaller chunks. On CODY they became the perfect bastard sons of Slint, DJ Shadow and Gorecki's Third Symphony, but on this record they get to the point more quickly. That's a pity in a way, because in my opinion, that perfectly slow –yet absolutely not boring– build-up is precisely what gave Mogwai the edge over all the other bands that make similar music. It's like a funeral march which, in order to show respect for the deceased, has been planned with attention to even the tiniest detail and is performed with all the necessary grandeur. So basically, the only (minor) criticism I can come up with for this album is that none of the songs is longer than 6 minutes.
Auto Rock is a great opener: slow and subtly crafted around a simple piano tune with a delicate injection of electronic sounds and guitar drones. As mentioned before, Glasgow Mega Snake explodes immediately, and also We're no here lets the guitars go wild. Travel is dangerous, on the other hand, finds a perfect balance between noise and subtle melancholy, but my favourite so far is the beautifully constructed Friend of the Night .
ther highly enjoyable tracks are the simple Acid Food with distorted vocals and a painfully beautiful pedal steel, the wonderful Folk Death 95, and I Chose Horses, which features Tetsuya Fukagawa of the Japanese hardcore band Envy. After 10 years, Mogway shows no signs of tiring and once again they prove that they can still easily compete with the best. MOGWAI!