Mogwai, 'Rave Tapes'

By: David Savage

                This album came out early in the year, but I still think worth writing now. There were two days in a row when I was driving home from work, listening to 93.1WXRT, and the songs that played were perfect. Like the rest of this winter, it was quiet and blustery, and the snow was stacking higher and higher on the streets. I used the Shazam application to find out what these songs were and on the first night, it was a song called “Heard About You Last Night” by Mogwai. The next night, another song by the same band, this time the track was “Remurdered”. I had no prior knowledge of this band before, but I knew I had to get acquainted.

                It turns out they had just released a record, titled Rave Tapes, on January 20^th. Like I said, I had never even heard of them before so I did some research. I found out they were a post-rock band from Scotland, and have been around since the early-to-mid 90’s. I guess I did things a little differently since Rave Tapes was the first record of theirs that I listened to. I fell in love with record, upon first listen. Instrumental acts aren’t too prominent in everyday airplay, so it was cool that my first experience with them came from the radio.

                The song that had me hooked was “Heard About You Last Night”. The first cut off Rave Tapes starts off very slow and ambient, and as the song continues it blossoms with steady bass notes and then the drums and guitar kick in. The first track is the most ambient and simple (in a good way) track off the record. The further in you get the heavier songs you discover, like “Hexon Bogon”. This is a band using synth in a more conservative way than most others. Mogwai lets the instruments shine throughout, but will occasionally give little hints of synth fills in the mix of the post-rock instrumentals.

                Rave Tapes is the type of record you let fill the background of a late night drive, or an outside look at the stars. The light vocal track, “Blues Hour”, features vocals that have a hint of Elliott Smith tied to them with a lasting crescendo to top it off. I dig Rave Tapes. I think it shows a good balance between rock, synth, and ambient instrumentals that is a breath of fresh air. I’m glad I turned on the radio to catch Mogwai.

Favorite Tracks: “Heard About You Last Night”, “Blues Hour”, and “Hexon Bogon”