Five Mogwai songs to check out
Yes! I Am A Long Way From Home Young Team 1997
Starting right at the beginning, Yes! I Am A Long
Way From Home is the first track from the band’s debut album and contains all the steady ambient meandering, volume swells and booming chorus sections the band are famed for. Rumour has it if you play the spoken work part at the end of the track backwards it’s quite rude. Dial : Revenge Rock Action 2001
With Take Me Somewhere
Nice stealing the show on the band’s third album Rock Action, Dial : Revenge (despite being a single from the album) has managed to hide in the shadows to a degree. One of Mogwai’s more tranquil tracks, the song opens up with this gentle acoustic guitar riff before Gruff Rhys of Super Furry Animals fame enters with a beautiful Welsh vocal melody.
Glasgow Mega-Snake Mr. Beast 2006
If Dial : Revenge is one of Mogwai’s more tranquil tracks, Glasgow MegaSnake is one of their more raucous. Opening with a clean fuzz-driven guitar riff that repeats throughout the song, this track is pure, fast-paced rock at its finest.
Crossing The Road Material Every Country’s Sun 2017
There is a degree of bias here as Crossing The Road Material is probably this author’s favourite Mogwai track. Opening with a dreamy mix of atmospheric keys and guitar, the track slowly builds with layers of drums, bass and additional guitar, before erupting into a massive sonic explosion that plays out to the end before dropping you back to earth with gentle aplomb. If you get the chance, check out the band’s recording of this track for KEHP on YouTube (www.youtube.com/ watch?v=sJ1DOf1zLCk) if for no other reason than seeing the smile that beams across Stuart’s face when the song explodes.
It’s What I Want To Do, Mum As The Love Continues 2021
There are a number of tracks from the new album that nearly made the cut, but we decided to go for the album’s closing track It’s What I
Want To Do, Mum. It’s one of the band’s slower tracks and, despite the big guitar riffs and hard hitting drums that come in and out of the mix, it retains an almost angelic sense of exposed vulnerability. Quite lovely.