It's in the Past...And Now, We Toast -- At the Drive-In

While I can't say that mixed emotions, hormones, and a bit of over-thinking weren't at the root of the final outburst, there was only one band's end that brought me to tears. Yeah, it was high school. Yeah, it was one of the rougher years of high school (though my years in it were not all that bad, to be honest). Still, I never saw them live, and I likely never will, unless their reunion turns into something more than a handful of festival shows. I've known other fans without having to seek them out, converted various friends, and even know someone from their hometown--with all of this, no one has ever (if I recall correctly, at least) recognized my (rather minimalist, to be fair) shirt advertising them. That's not an exclusive claim, of course, but for a band that got this big--even if it was a flash when they were big--it's a bit surprising all the same.

They basically had one, one-and-a-half big hits that went around the country and the world openly. They were both off the same album, and it came out twelve years ago. The band has faded to a footnote (similar to how The Skids--see poll on the right, if you haven't--are mentioned, despite the impression I've gotten that they were well-thought of during their existence) in many ways, to the acts that followed in their wake from the splintered elements they left behind them. It's weird, really, as they feel more lost and faded than a lot of the much older (and also defunct) bands I listen to. Not in the sense of ingenuity, so much as the feeling that their impact on the public conscious, even the "indie" one, was minor, and more of a name than an associated music.

Doubtless, at least a few people who know me could guess exactly who I am talking about right now. It's possible, too, that some people will guess with some semblance of dread, though I don't think one ought to. Still, tastes are tastes, and there's no accounting for them, etc., but I ask--as always--that you approach this music, new, loved, old, hated, with an open mind and listen to it to hear what there might be in it to love for those of us who do, if you don't know already.

Here's that seemingly unrecognized shirt:

It's Thunder and It's Lightning, And Where Are Your Manners? -- The Sound of (Modern) Young(ish) Scotland

For some reason--likely boiled down to the single word "Mogwai"--Scotland has managed to become an important source of music for me. There was nothing calculated or deliberate about it, as Mogwai simply drew me in with the 4 Satin EP, of all things, and particularly "Superheroes of BMX." I had legal access to most of their catalogue and ate through it quickly, following it to either end--the oldest and the newest, until eventually they were one of my ridiculously, excessively, obsessively collected bands. No, I didn't start looking for an original copy of "Tuner"/"Lower," but I did (digitally) track down everything I could. I was most excited about getting a copy of the expanded version of the creatively titled EP, now titled EP+6, as it included all of the original EP and two of their other extended plays, though ones with more thought-out titles, being 4 Satin and No Education=No Future (Fuck the Curfew).¹ The latter contains what I feel was their personal apex: "Xmas Steps."

Mogwai are probably best known for their early approach to dynamics, known colloquially as "loud-quiet-loud." They come from a group of bands collectively termed "post-rock" for their tendency toward unusual usage of rock instrumentation, not necessarily avoiding pop-style song structures, but playing the characteristic rock trio of instruments--guitar, bass, drums--in unusual ways, generally with a greater wash or wave of sound than even the riffs of harder rock. Often in almost orchestral or mood-oriented or anthemic, soundtrack-style fashion.² It also has a tendency to avoid prominent vocals--often lacking them entirely, or working through vocoders and samples. A slew of bands arose in the late '90s and early '00s under the auspice of "post rock," from Godspeed You Black Emperor! (later Godspeed You! Black Emperor--no, I'm not kidding) to Cerberus Shoal to Sigur Rós to the thousand splinter GYBE groups in Montreal (A Silver Mt. Zion, Do Make Say Think, et al.) on to Explosions in the Sky and many, many others. Mogwai come more from the "Slint" school of "post-rock," which tends toward the louder elements, the noise, the, somewhat ironically, "rock" elements.