With his 9th album, Mogwai rises by asserting his rock line.
Mogwai has been around for more than 20 years. Few bands achieve such longevity, and each album is an opportunity to question its future. It was with the producer of two of their first albums that the musicians recorded. Should we expect them to return to the sounds of rock? The question arose all the more that with the departure of its guitarist John Cummings, and the electronic turn taken with the synthesizers on his previous album Rave Tapes, one could think that the musical line of the Glasgow band could be redefined.
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A reassuring album
The first track Coolverine, provides a superb introduction that only knots with electronic sounds in the middle of the song. The mixture still takes as well, without giving anything to the electronics. The cover that really launches the piece, thin and metallic, gives its place to the brass that are more present. Party in the dark, the second track is really the most catchy of the album. The vocal lines echo in an optimistic chorus ("taken from those spirals […] hungry for another piece of mind"), panting and a little pop. We listen to it again and again. Brain sweeties , which mixes percussion, synthesizer and keyboard, could have opened a mysterious film. Mogwai hasn't tired of working with filmmakers for years. A thoughtful and perhaps disturbing piece. The song Crossing The Road Material is illuminated by the electric guitar.
Aka 47 slows down the tempo of the album, while in 20 Size, the listener is embarked on a gradual rise that illuminates a sound eruption, very graceful even if melancholic. 1000 foot face claims to bring down the intensity and coats the listener in a cocoon, to better extract it, with percussions ever more present and heady. Don't believe the Fife takes amplitude with a high keyboard, while Battered at a scramble gives pride of place to the guitar, no offense to John Cummings who left the group. Almost at the end of the album, Old Poison pulls a violent and powerful sound that tumbles in this song pulling towards the bottom. To finish in style, Every country's sun concludes with the eponymous title of the album. By producing a synthesis of the trends that stand out within the album, he can leave the impression that he would constitute both the conclusion and the prologue.
Mogwai, even amputated of his guitarist, demonstrates with this album that he has a continuity that will reassure fans of the early days. And he will show those who will listen to him for the first time with the album Every country's sun, that it is a great band that it is.
