Funny thing I've discovered about Mogwai fans, is that no two fans, online publications, or review sites can agree on the exact order of Mogwai albums quality-wise. While this is true for most bands, it's especially pronounced with Mogwai.

(Keep in mind I am speaking of their full length LPs only, not their live album or any of their EPs or singles, although you're certainly welcome to bring them up.)

Most fans claim Young Team to be their best album, but for me, it's the exact opposite. While I find all five full-lengths are great, I can't help but believe this year's Mr. Beast is the best Mogwai has ever done.

It betters Happy Songs For Happy People, which I thought was their best they had ever done, which bettered Rock Action which I thought was the best they had ever done, which bettered Come On Die Young, which I thought was the best they had done, which bettered Young Team.

Does anybody else believe they've improved with each subsequent releases?

By the way, if you can't tell, I'm seriously enjoying Mr. Beast. I think it has been unfairly compared to their previous work (most notably Young Team) even though it sounds quite different from anything they've done.

I like Rock Action the best.

What do you guys think of Ten Rapid? I'm listening to it for the first time, and its sounds as good as anything I've ever heard from Mogwai. (I've only heard Mr. Beast, Rock Action, and Young Team.)

Just listened to Happy Songs For Happy People for the first time today. My first impression is it's the best thing Mogwai has done.

I think everyone in this thread needs to read Nick Southall's article on www.stylusmagazine.com from this week called "Imperfect Sound Forever." The article goes in depth about how new mastering techniques are rendering music less dynamic by compressing the music to such a degree that the quiet and loud bits of bands are now at the exact same level (he uses Mogwai specifically hence my suggestion that you read the article). Under the older mastering techniques a record like Young Team has quiet parts and then the loud parts are dynamic and actually jarring when a transition is made such as in the song "Like Herod." Answer this, how can a band that has based pretty much its whole catalog on the exploration of dynamics be very dynamic when new mastering techniques have rendered every record since Young Team undynamic by compressing the levels to where the loud parts and the soft parts are at the exact same volume? I do still like all of the band's albums but maybe this is why Young Team stands out to me personally as the better album when all of the others seem to run together.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: jonathanbrisby,

I actually hate it when there's a huge difference in volume between or within songs. I don't particularly want to sustain hearing damage, yet I would still like to be able to discern what is being played on the quiet parts, so I always end up fooling with the volume when the noise differential is too much. It gets annoying.

Did you read the article? It talks about people basically not "listening" to music anymore. When you can ignore differences that are supposed to be there in texture and volume music becomes just "wallpaper." I definitely think you are entitled to your opinion and I actually wrote Nick Southall concerning some major points I had with the article, specifically how difficult it becomes to listen to songs next to one another on an iTunes shuffle or mix CD. I do appreciate dynamics, like I said before how can a band like Mogwai whose whole sound is based on dynamics be worth a shit if they aren't just that, dynamic? The article goes into some serious detail concerning the subject and it changed my mind about a few things. I used to get annoyed when older CDs weren't loud enough, but now after hearing an accurate and academic portrayal of changes within the music industry that have affected sound quality in a bad way I've changed my views. I still like having remastered CDs and better sound quality but he makes a distinct point about records like the new Flaming Lips being mastered so that it's just loud all the time and blasting in your face to try and make up for the fact that the music isn't put together very well.

I'll read the article, but probably tomorrow. I got less than 4 hours sleep last night, and I really need to get to bed.

That's an interesting observation about "Young Team." I didn't know that.

But "Mr. Beast" could easily be Mogwai's best release to date.

I read about 2/3 of the article. It's too long for me to read the whole thing. I gotta say, though, I really don't buy the whole sound quality argument. I've heard people who will say how much better vinyl is than CD's. I've never really noticed a big difference in quality. Same goes for mp3's. Some people will go on and on about how horrible 128kbps mp3's are. I've listened to no-loss files and 128 mp3's back to back and I cannot tell the difference. I don't buy the idea that the music has to be super-high, non-compressed for you to be able to listen closely and appreciate it either. Being able to hear the incidental creak of a chair in the backgroud of some song is not my idea of truly appreciating a piece of music. Maybe Southall should spend less time straining to hear extraneous noises so he can show off about it and spend more time actually listening to the melodies, notes, harmonies, percussion, etc.

And I still maintain that I'd rather have my CD's at a relatively even volume. Too much variation in volume and you either can't hear the quiet parts or you're damaging your hearing. Or you have to keep your hand on the volume controls, which sucks.

On the other side, I pretty much hate the whole lo-fi ethic too. I don't want tape hiss or poor recording equipment to get in the way of the songs. It's not more realistic, as some people claim. If a guy is playing guitar in my living room, there is no tape hiss or fuzziness. It's all very clear.

quote:

On the other side, I pretty much hate the whole lo-fi ethic too. I don't want tape hiss or poor recording equipment to get in the way of the songs. It's not more realistic, as some people claim. If a guy is playing guitar in my living room, there is no tape hiss or fuzziness. It's all very clear.

By all means please buy me and every other struggling, no money having, musician a decent piece of recording equipment then. I don't think technology should be a barrier to entry when it comes to music. I respect the fact that many excellent songs/compositions have been made on shoestring budgets and prevail despite the fact.

As for the whole argument about dynamics, I'm just going to have to disagree with you on that one. While I enjoy having my music remastered/mastered with decent quality I think the world would be a boring place if everything was at the same level. On top of that, I can definitely tell a huge difference between mp3s and CDs. You want to argue against lo-fi? Mp3s are lo-fi, many of them are compressed to the point that you can distinctly hear a digital hiss underneath the recording.

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Originally posted by jonathanbrisby:
By all means please buy me and every other struggling, no money having, musician a decent piece of recording equipment then. I don't think technology should be a barrier to entry when it comes to music. I respect the fact that many excellent songs/compositions have been made on shoestring budgets and prevail despite the fact.

So, I should start liking lo-fi stuff so poor artists can be successful? I would like it better it technology and money should be barriers to entry in music either, but I'm not gonna lie and say I think lo-fi stuff is great.

Besides which, I was under the impression that it's pretty easy to get pretty good recording equipment fairly cheaply these days. I don't really know much about recording equipment though, so I could be wrong. I do know that there have been some home-recorded records that aren't lo-fi at all, like Adem's Homesongs, which is one of my favorite records of the past 5 years.

There's a lot of stuff out there that's called lo-fi that I don't really consider lo-fi at all, like Swearing At Motorists latest album. It's described as lo-fi, but it all sounds pretty clear to me. When I say lo-fi, I'm talking 4-track era Mountain Goats, The Creek Drank the Cradle, Bee Thousand, stuff like that. I mean, I still really like Creek Drank the Cradle because of all the great songs, but I would like it a lot more if the songs were clearer and not all muddled and distant. I think the songs from Creek are better than the songs on Our Endless Numbered Days, but I still consider the latter to be Iron and Wine' best album because I can hear the songs more clearly.

To be honest I don't care for many of those recordings myself. I hate Guided By Voices and The Mountain Goats. I was referring to albums like Sebadoh III and Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska. I think the quality of the songs comes through over the lack of recording quality. By the way, I too prefer Creek Drank the Cradle over Iron & Wine's other recordings, although most of his stuff doesn't appeal to me. Usually I'll just listen to Bonnie "Prince" Billy or Nick Drake when I'm in the mood for something like that.

Iron and Wine is amazing. All of it. OMGz.

I think the production of records definately has an effect on the listener...or at least it has an effect on me. Good production is an art within itself and there's no doubt that it adds to the music. I'm a fan of the mountain goats and i must say, I like their/his last three albums (especially sunset tree) over all the others. Do you think listening to 'lift your skinny fists like anteannas to heaven' by godspeed you black emperor would be the listening experience it is without clear production values? no way, man.

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Originally posted by Shak:
I think the production of records definately has an effect on the listener...or at least it has an effect on me. Good production is an art within itself and there's no doubt that it adds to the music. I'm a fan of the mountain goats and i must say, I like their/his last three albums (especially sunset tree) over all the others.

I'm a big Mountain Goats fan, and I feel the exact same way.

One thing that I think is important to note with the whole recording process. And that is the fact that you can get amazing quality sound out of a 4 track. You really can. In fact, unless you're going the recording route, where you are basically plugging your guitar directly into a computer to use software to manipulate the sound, you are often using 4 tracks and other sort of things to record before you bring it over to a computer to manipulate sound. The key thing with many recordings done this way is getting good microphones. Using good microphones to record your music is almost just as important as anything to get quality sound. So, when you're thinking of lo-fi, etc, a lot of it may have to do with the microphones a band uses....microphones will have a huge impact on the clarity of the recording.

So, I didn't make my final point (sorry!), and that is that you can really get a lot out of a 4 track by just having quality microphones.

The point I was originally trying to make was about remastering techniques though, not lo-fi versus hi-fi aesthetic. The recordings that I was referring to by Mogwai were all originally produced well enough in full multi-track studios, it's how these records were mastered that I was making the case against. Just to make myself more clear. The point was about how mastering techniques used on newer albums robs them of their dynamic sound. That is what we were originally debating, at least between RavingLunatic and myself.

Right. Yeah, i understand that. I guess I was just responding to RavingLunatic's comment about lo-fi.

My bad for taking it off-subject.