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NICHOLAS BARBER

Mogwai: Come On Die Young (Chemikal Underground)

1997's Young Team sold over 35,000 copies and its magical follow-up is set to do even better. Not bad for a scruffy Scottish indie band who specialise in very quiet, very slow, very simple and very repetitive instrumentals. On CODY, Mogwai are more downbeat and desolate than ever, although the music sometimes builds to a tidal wave before subsiding again to gentle ripples, and the hushed guitars and drums are sometimes augmented by keyboards, flute and crackling voice-overs, as if you were hearing a radio stuck between two stations late at night. Obvious influences are Spiritualized, the Velvet Underground and My Bloody Valentine, and it makes sense that CODY was produced by Dave Fridmann, who worked on Mercury Rev's Deserter's Songs. However, Mogwai are yet to match their forebears: the band are too often hypnotised by the power of repeated minor chord patterns to write enough genuinely pretty tunes, such as "Waltz For Aidan". When Mogwai, or former members of Mogwai, fulfil their potential in a few years' time, this album will be remembered as an important prototype of what was to come.