after several minutes, the clouds tower over you and you must stand guarded against the wind that blows with ever-increasing force. as the clouds move closer to you, the wind picks up slightly and you feel the coldness of the occasional raindrop on your skin. you hear a rumble in the distance and open your eyes to see dark thunderclouds on the horizon. the guitar blast hits at the four-minute mark on the track, but "new paths to helicon pt i" requires every second of those first four minutes to ensnare the listener.įor the uninitiated, the best way that i can describe the average mogwai track is to ask that you close your eyes and picture yourself on a flat plain, perhaps a wheat field or an uninhabited desert. On mogwai's latest release, government commissions, a collection of bbc recordings spanning from the scottish band's early phase in 1996 to the release of their most recent studio album, happy songs for happy people, the instrumental that blew me away back in the summer of 2001 can be found in all its live glory. finally, the sonic wave crest of guitar distortion struck and, as the stage lights brightened accordingly, loudness washed over us with an oceanic intensity that was somehow both fierce and serene. the deceptively simple instrumental took several minutes to build up momentum and those of us in the audience could feel the change in the air, almost like the tingle at the back of one’s neck when one watches the pressure needle in a boiler room slowly inch past the red marks. stuart braithwaite and company barely seemed to move at all on the stage as the instrumental began with the windy whisper of keyboards joined by a subtly ominous bass line and suppressed cymbal percussion. If i had to name a particular moment from the past decade when i came the closest to musical transcendence, one of the first to come to mind would be the night of june 19, 2001, when i stood in the crowd at variety playhouse in atlanta and watched mogwai play "new paths to helicon pt i". and listening to these bbc sessions we're tempted to think it just might still be. so here's a kick in the pants, a reminder, a trip back to the first time you heard 'young team' and thought to yourself, "what the fuck" and then probably moments later thought "this is the greatest thing mogwai kept putting out amazing records, playing devastating live shows, and perfecting their gorgeously schizophrenic sound. but that has more to do with fickle indie rockers than the way things were. ![]() ![]() for a while there, mogwai were the next big thing, and then they -were- the big thing, but then, for some reason, interest seemed to wane, and mogwai were just another band making pretty good records. mogwai do their 'thing' (the thing that every post-slint post-rock band has tried to do for the last decade) better than anybody. You might say that all that you (and we) love about mogwai is perfectly encapsulated on this disc! the crushing squalls of distortion, the shimmery washes of dreamy ambience, the slow building epics, the tranquil shimmery barely-there pop often complely obliterated by a feroicous onslaught of thick distorted guitars and pounding drums, shoegaze meets metallicĬrunch meets slowcore meets minimal pop meets ferocious noise rock. Mastering for this release was completed prior to the 'curiosa' tour (july 2004). It’s lush.Bright light ! an unofficial mogwai web site bl!Īll tracks recorded bbc radio john peel or steve lamacq sessions. Especially ‘New Paths To Helicon Part 1’. ![]() Having got our grubby mitts on a copy, we can highly recommend. ’Government Commissions (BBC Sessions 1996-2003)’ is released on 21st February 2005 Some are sketchy, but to be honest, so are we. Some are definitely better than the official recordings. Speaking of the release, group leader Stuart Braithwaite said: “ The reason why we’re putting out this collection is simple, the recordings here are worth hearing. The majority of the ten tracks were recorded at Maida Vale Studios and the cuts range from 1996 to 2003 (check out the old-skool 'gwai picture on the right), supplying a rather handy overview of the band’s career so far. ![]() In a fitting and timely tribute, Peel heroes Mogwai are to release an album’s worth of BBC Radio sessions in February 2005.
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