Performer Notes

Mogwai: Stuart Leslie Braithwaite, Dominic Aitchison, John Cummings, Martin Bulloch, Brendan O'Hare.
Additional personnel includes: Aidan Moffat (vocals); Shona Brown (flute).
Recorded at MCM Studios, Hamilton, Scotland in 1997.
Judging from this stunning album, Scotland's Mogwai are hell-bent to load up Sonic Youth and Pavement's lo-fi psych-meets-pop breakthroughs onto a silver rocket, and fly into the heart of the sun. Mogwai are all about the melodic-but-noisy instrumental. When they construct a good long one--and there are plenty on YOUNG TEAM--the rollercoaster can be as thrilling and forward-propelling as a late-era Coltrane solo. Two guitars interweave sheets of sonic sabotage, and yet instead of dark, harsh slabs, they emerge with melodies that share much with the early "pop" efforts of the afore-mentioned Stocktonites and with Syd-era Floyd. Combine these qualities with their complete grasp of Albini's law of instrumental dynamics (loud/soft/loud/soft/etc.--see "Like Herod" for prime example) and what comes out is a unique, forceful and catchy statement of purpose.

Professional Reviews

Melody Maker (11/1/97, p.44) - "...Mogwai fashion raw electricity into gravity-heavy melodies of impossibly sad sweetness....with massive amounts of distortion."

Kerrang (Magazine) (p.50) - "A series of scathing, violent, beautiful, poignant and majestic instrumentals, it combined the attitude of punk with inspirational dynamics and pathos."

Q (Magazine) (p.150) - 3 stars out of 5 -- "When, for example, 'Like Herod''s slow beats and furtive guitars explode into feedbacking rock action, this is music as continual mood swing..."

Paste (magazine) (p.67) - "The 12-minute track 'Like Herod' introduces a sleepy, rolling guitar figure, which later erupts into a screeching opus of distorted, cresting guitar blasts. Such dynamic contrasts offer the record's most riveting moments..."