HAPPY SONGS FOR HAPPY PEOPLE

I do not own a complete discography of Mogwai. I own four albums: "Kicking A Dead Pig", "Come On, Die Young", "Young Team" and "Happy Songs for Happy People", and also the single of "My Father, My King." Of these albums, and the few songs I've heard off of "Ten Rapid" and "Rock Action" I think I'm able to say this is clrealy Mogwai's top notch. "Happy Songs" is one of the most complete albums I've ever listened to, and I must admit, is my favorite album of all time. In the modern era, the art of an album has been all but lost. Who needs an album when you can just download the two or so tracks you like? Not with a collection like this. Each song is entirly listenable, addictive. Almost every song on this album at one point in time was my favorite on the album, each different yet all somehow similar. The album is undeniably dark throughout its entirety, yet spots of bright and serene beauty often sneak their way into the listener's unprepared ears. Beginning with the slow, frightening clamor of "Hunted by a Freak" and the sad but beautiful "Moses I Amn't", the tone lifts and because lighter and brighter as the incredible, symphonic echoing sounds of "Kids of Skeletons" lift the listener to a whole other place. The pace quickens with "Killing All the Flies", a song containing a terrifying transition from melody to melodic-chaos, a signature card in Mogwai's hand. The tracks "Boring Machines Disturbs Sleep", "Ratts in the Capital", and "Golden Porsche" bring the tone back to its darker side, "Ratts" perhaps being particularly harder and angrier than the other two. "I Know You Are, but What Am I?" breaks into the album with some discordance and a slightly annoying single note played on the piano throughout the whole of the song, but it certainly has its own place. Perhaps more haunting than other tracks, at the same time it could also be considered, by some, more upbeat. Finally, the album closes with "Stop Coming to My House," a dramatic, highly experimental yet rhythmically impressive. Beginning with a far off sound, the song explodes into an in your head beat that lasts until the very end, in which a very scary cartoon sound- track appears behind the music. This album truly represents not just the best of Mogwai, but the best of post-rock. This album is a post-rock doorway to new listeners, and a great return to simplistic yet highly emotionally and involved music for current experimental rock fans. Different from Sigur Ros's slow high pitched opera, and Radiohead's hard-rock/electronica infusion, Mogwai offers something novel in this album. Somewhat similar to Godspeed You Black Emperor, but not quite as crazy, Mogwai honestly exemplifies a new era in rock that has changed music for me, and probably will for others.