faith in music restored



Mogwai - Happy Songs for Happy People

You know I think they've finally done it, the perfect Mogwai album, I have no idea how they are going to top this one. There last album, Rock Action, was good but at times got a bit too... ordinary I guess; but this one just soars above that both musically and emotionally, personally I don't think there is a bad song on it. The title is a lie though, it sin't a particularly happy album - in fact I have a feeling the song "I know you are but what am I?" is going to become a bit of a theme tune to alot of people's lonely nights. Anyway, overall opinion: fucking glorious.



Spring Heel Jack - Live

The memories come flooding back - I saw Spring Heel Jack and the associated jazz musicians on this CD play live sometime in January at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, that event has to go down as one of the greatest gigs/concerts I have witnessed. This CD contains a live recording from the same tour, although this was recorded in Brighton, I'm quite surprised how similar it sounds to what I heard in London. Anyway what do you get here? Well, two tracks, each documenting one half of the perfomance, it displays moments of complete unbridled noise, and moments of pure beauty, sometimes both at the same time - I really don't know how to describe it, it's not really jazz, not really electronica - saying that it's somewhere inbetween doesn't really do it justice. I'm just glad that there are groups brave enough to create this sort of music...