S Poddar
One word keeps surfacing in the conversation with Glasgow’s beloved post-rock band, Mogwai—”weird.”
That was “psychedelically weird” when their last album, As The Love Continues, tops the UK charts in 2021. A surreal success if ever there is one, but it happened amidst a global pandemic.
“So we couldn’t even go to the pub to talk about how weird it was,” frontman Stuart Braithwaite remembers with a laugh.
The success did take them as far as the Mercury Prize gala, however, which, being something of a quirky affair, was “such a weird ceremony.” But despite all the unexpectedness, the band didn’t let it impact their creative process while working on their latest album, The Bad Fire.
In fact, they were so disconnected to the notion of being chart-toppers that they didn’t even mention it to their new producer, John Congleton—who has worked with the likes of St Vincent, The Killers, Blondie, and Modest Mouse. It was only in an interview with a French journalist that he came to know of it.
“He was like, ‘Wait, your last album went to number one?’ And we were like, ‘Yeah’.”.
“And he was like, ‘Wow, that’s weird’.
To be fair, he had a point.
Mogwai never seemed the kind of band destined for mainstream chart dominance. They started as a group of longtime friends with a shared love for making “serious guitar music,” crafting sprawling, atmospheric instrumentals brimming with emotion. Their rise to number one took an astonishing 25 years, helped in part by the UK chart rules, which give more weight to physical record sales than streaming numbers.
Mogwai, with their fiercely loyal fanbase that treasures vinyl, found themselves in the right place at the right time. For one triumphant week, they outsold pop heavyweights like Dua Lipa and Harry Styles.
“It was a huge surprise,” Braithwaite admits. “We want our music to do as well as it can, but we’re not uber-ambitious. We’re not like Queen, plotting world domination.”
However, just as they could have ridden the momentum of their surprise victory, life threw a series of challenges in their way.
Personal Battles Behind The Bad Fire
As the group prepared to start recording on their new album, keyboardist Barry Burns was delivered some shattering news: his daughter was gravely ill. Diagnosed with aplastic anaemia, a rare condition where the body stops producing enough blood cells, the diagnosis was nothing short of terrifying.
“She had blood coming out of her gums and bruises all over,” he shares. “It was extremely stressful.”
The disorder is incredibly rare, occurring in only around 30 to 40 children a year in the UK. For Burns, the diagnosis cut even deeper, thanks to a childhood memory.
“The weird thing was that my neighbor when I was a kid had it, and sadly, she died,” he says. “So obviously, I really panicked because I thought I knew the outcome-but thankfully, the treatment is completely different now.”
After a bone marrow transplant and chemotherapy, his daughter recovered.
“She’s going to be fine, but I’ve had an awful two years.”
The band had to suffer through more pain. Long-time live agent Mick Griffiths died of cancer. Bassist Dominic Aitchison lost his father. Even Braithwaite’s favourite pooch, Prince, got cancer and had to lose a leg three months before the recording sessions started.
As much as one might expect The Bad Fire to be a sombre reflection on pain and death, this is not the style of Mogwai.
“If anything weighty happens in my life, the last thing I want to do is write a song about it,” Braithwaite once told The Herald—a philosophy that still holds true.
Predominantly instrumental, Mogwai’s music has always been open to interpretation. They deliberately give their songs abstract or nonsensical titles to avoid boxing listeners into a specific meaning. Tracks like You’re Lionel Richie, Secret Pint, and Simon Ferocious are part of that tradition, and the new album follows suit with intriguingly named compositions such as Pale Vegan Hip Pain and Fanzine Made of Flesh.
Still, there is a faint sense of the band’s emotional journey. The massive, distortion-heavy 18 Volcanoes finds Braithwaite whispering, “Hope has come another day / Hold me close in every way.”
“Some journalists in France said the album was really cathartic, and I can kind of see that,” he says. “But I don’t think it’s maudlin at all. It’s vaguely upbeat, by our standards.”
Looking Ahead
Released last Friday, The Bad Fire has already started sending ripples out into the nation, vying for a Top Five spot alongside big names Central Cee and Teddy Swims. Again, physical sales favour Mogwai.
“The streaming world is very murky and hard to understand,” Braithwaite says. “It does make a lot of money, but it makes a lot of money for old music and artists with popular back catalogues, and I think that’s really discouraged a lot of big labels from investing in new music.”
He also attacks the generic AI-generated music that floods platforms such as Spotify, especially in the ambient genres such as chill-out and lo-fi.
“You absolutely know that if anyone’s going to be making generic AI music, it’s going to be the streaming services, just so they don’t have to pay humans.”
Yet digital channels have also brought the band an unforeseen amount of publicity. The band’s 2005 single Take Me Somewhere Nice has received 85 million YouTube views thanks to a video uploaded by a fan who depicted a girl with her head inside an upside-down goldfish bowl, which is the original illustration from game designer Ken Wong. Fans have become so associated with the song that they have tattooed the image on themselves.
“I almost want to go, ‘Mate, you know, that’s not the cover of the record’,” Braithwaite jokes. “But it’s cool. And the comments under the video are like an endless message board of young kids supporting each other. There’s an agony aunt vibe about it.”
For a band that once sold T-shirts making fun of its rivals, Mogwai has come a long way. And as they celebrate their 30th anniversary, the journey from scrappy Glaswegian upstarts to respected rock veterans feels both surreal and hard-earned.
So, did they ever picture themselves here when they first practiced together in Braithwaite’s parents’ house all those years ago?
“Well, I thought we’d have flying cars by now,” he chuckles. “So any excitement at the fact that I was still scratching by as a musician would likely be tempered by the lack of jet packs.”
In other words, it all just feels. odd.
