Mogwai

Watching Mogwai is not about dissecting their music, weighing up the different influences and continually using the word ‘potential’. There is no potential. This is it. They’re here, playing now and they are spectacular. Their music is flawless, the hollow melodies, complimented by disturbing rumblings which culminate in an ear-bleeding forte are played with a perfect balance of ferociousness and delicacy. The bulk of their set comes from new album ‘Happy Songs For Happy People’, but worry not, Mogwai have not abandoned the dark cloud that descended upon their previous material. In fact, the cloud seems to have got so black and heavy that it gushes into the new material, creating a demonic joy that hypnotises and grips the crowd.

I could give you a step-by-step guide of each of their tracks but to do so would give the live experience a discredit. The current set is like a collection of poems, each individually telling its own particular tale but together creating a wondrous mass of incoherent noise and intricate orchestration. Live, they could easily slip into rehearsal mode, with the music becoming insular and the audience resentful of the good time they are having. Mogwai, though, are serious, there is always a destination for the music and I could swear that a couple of the numbers even clocked in at under five minutes.

They finish and I feel shattered, the whole audience are frozen after the band leave, numb and willing to go the distance, waiting for the last amp do be turned off. That is why I do this, why I care, because standing amongst the hoards of skeletal kids with thousand mile stares I feel fantastic.