Mogwai, "Young Team"
Mogwai's re-mastered debut is an intoxicating mix of repetition, slowly emerging tunes, and violent crescendos. When we add in their use of conversational voices, dark humor, and a penchant for anonymity they resemble (at the risk of sacrilege) early-mid period Pink Floyd.
Naturally, Young Team has an integrity that its companion disc (of b-sides, live versions, and a Spacemen 3 cover) simply can’t match. The sequence of tracks is a nigh on perfect listen from start to finish. “Yes, I am A Long Way From Home” sounds like friends calmly chucking a stick of lighted dynamite around between them. We don’t know exactly when, but it’s obvious that that an explosion is coming and, if anything, the participants seem to be relishing the prospect.
“Like Herod” merges the angular calm of Tortoise and the pimple-bursting intensity of Slint into something that (even at nearly 12 minutes) feels too short. Maybe it is the circularity of the rhythms, or the fact that tracks never resolve in a way that obliterates the sense of expectation, but Mogwai always leave me wanting more. As regards the Chicago influence, it's worth noting that Directions in Music came two years before Young Team and the link seems obvious.
There is a seriousness and humor in these grooves that coalesces into a raging desire to obliterate something so that something else may flourish. Art through destruction is nothing new, of course. Do I imagine the blended effects of ancient architecture, history, unemployment, rain, beer, heroin, Westminster, domestic violence, Sectarianism, and the proverbial Glasgow Kiss? No matter, it still sounds as vital today as it did in 1997.
On “Katrien” the use of conversation as ‘vocals’ works marvelously, seeming to dictate the beat rather than match it. The relative frippery of “Radar Maker” is like a piece of Shakespearean light relief before the inevitable bloodbath. Sure enough, on the second such piano interlude “With Portfolio” the group eventually lacerates any semblance of lightness with a section of stereo flashing feedback hi-jinks not heard since the distant days of Led Zeppelin II .
The pace slows for breath again during “R u still in 2 it” which has gentle, brooding, epic undertones over which is spoken a love-letter as simultaneously trite and heartfelt as an adolescent text message. When this spoken word leaps into actual singing the effect is to illustrate that passion is ordinary, hilarious, doomed and yet blissful. Then we have (for them) a happy hour knees-up called “A Cheery Wave From Stranded Youngsters.” The contrast is essential as, without delay, we are into the epic (16 minutes) and thunderous “Mogwai Fear Satan” a track which shows an essential difference between Mogwai and other post-rock (sic) bands. Mono, Explosions In The Sky, and others took this blueprint and produced music of their own that is life-affirming because it sounds like the Myth of Sisyphus—pushing the boulder up that hill again and again. “Mogwai Fear Satan” reveals a band that carries a greater threat, since in their version that boulder is chasing you down the slope and when you blink you are back at the top again and it is right behind you. With the storm approaching it is as if we are channeling the genetic memories of the chilly-kneed centurions casting wary glances into the mist beyond the north side of Hadrian’s Wall.
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