There are two sounds that really define Mogwai. One is a wall of guitar so
dense and loud and turbulent that it blows your hair back, even coming out
of the tinniest of speakers. This is the Mogwai that melts eardrums and
inhibitions in a live setting, the fists-in-the-air rock-action Mogwai. The
other essential Mogwai sound is quieter, a series of plaintive piano notes,
each picked with care and allowed to reverberate for a dreamy, meditative
interval.
On Mr. Beast, Mogwai's fifth album, the band provides
space for both kinds of experiences, the loud and the soft, the aggressive
and the pensively reticent. What's interesting is how the two poles
reinforce each other here, the blistering surge of "Glasgow Mega-Snake"
clearing the air for "Acid Food"'s down-tempo drum beat and pedal-steel
guitar flourishes, the glassy calm of "I Choose Horses" leading to the
majestic swagger of "We're No Here." They're not so much opposites as
alternate sides of the same coin, segueing with surprising smoothness so
that it's easy to forget exactly where you are in the album or what comes
next.
The album begins in near silence, a few faint guitar tones wrapped around
piano notes as "Auto Rock" opens. Barry Burns' piano is first a whisper,
then a conversation, then a crashing oration, all against a pulsing
backdrop of guitar and drums. "Auto Rock" is one long crescendo, building
and building, as it sets the stage for "Glasgow Mega-Snake." This is the
album's first full-on guitar onslaught, an Armageddon of tones wrapped in
an off-kilter time signature, dying back to nothing, then flaring up again
in squalling, scale-mounting explosions of feedback. The transition to
"Acid Food" is somewhat abrupt, the glorious noise cutting away to
unadorned guitar chords and drum-machine metronomics. Yet once you're past
the boundary, the cut becomes an island of tranquility, its twanging lap
steel — that's Dave McGowan from Teenage Fan Club — spinning lazy arcs of
countrified melody. "Travel Is Dangerous" bridges both extremes, starting
in ominous quietude and erupting into oceanic waves of distortion. There's
an epic twitch to gorgeous "Team Handed," its drum line unfurling in
ritual-paced glory, cymbal crashes spaced at intervals among long, tranquil
piano meditations.
Mogwai save their two strongest cuts for last. "I Choose Horses" is
luminously beautiful, all shifting, rainbow-colored auras floating around a
muttered, half-heard series of spoken words. The words are indecipherable
— they're in Japanese and spoken by Tetsuya Fugakawa from Envy — yet they
become the wavering center of this wonderful piece. Despite the fact that
they don't convey any specific meaning, or perhaps because of it, the words
feel laden with mystery, melancholy and meaning. They give shape to the
mournful piano line, the swirling textures of guitar, and make this cut
feel like a visit to a parallel universe. The disc ends with "We're No
Here," a dense and distorted march toward glory, its slow, aching melody
anchored by bass and repeated, an octave or two up, by guitar. The pace is
measured, weighted with heavy sound, and punctuated by echoing drum
shots. It is larger, more vibrant, louder than life — and filled with
triumphant metallic grandeur. It is hard to say which side of Mogwai is
more moving, the quietly beautiful or the transcendently loud, but
the great thing about Mr. Beast is that you don't have to decide.
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