Mogwai & Kid 606 - London Royal Albert Hall - 22/9/06
5/5
By: Thomas Hannan
To be honest, I didn't expect to see Mogwai in the Albert Hall - ever - and they appear pretty surprised about it themselves. They're a scuzzy band for me, previously deemed by these ears too dangerous, too edgy, just too loud for these grandiose surroundings. But in their music there has developed something serenely cinematic, which I suppose does fit this large, plush, extravagant scale rather well. Kid 606, however, doesn't have that - or at least he didn't. And he's the support. That's a surprise.
The last time The Kid and I met (OK, so we didn't actually meet per se), I was off my face. Everyone was off their own respective faces. The crowd. The bar staff. The Kid himself. Even Mogwai, who were curating the day at the All Tomorrow's Parties festival that hosted his set, had noted at the end of their performance that after their last tune, they were going to "get drunk and watch Kid 606". They did. They even invaded the stage. It was a hands in the air like you just don't care party, a rave set, perhaps the most rewardingly banging of music I've ever witnessed. Mogwai chose the bill that day, as one assumes they have this for this special, if peculiar evening. So now, each time I've seen Kid 606, it's been Mogwai's fault. Thanks, Mogwai.
Tonight, he understandably (given the environment) tones it down a little, and draws much material from his decidedly more chilled out, most recent 'Resilience' record, which baffled many of those who heard it and soothed the ears of the rest. It makes for a very cosy sound in which comforting bass lines abound over gently clicking beats and swathes of atmospheric noise. That sounds dull as hell, but somehow isn't, as anyone who has ever analysed a beat structure would gleefully testify. He does too retain a little bit of that danger that makes him so exciting, and whilst the mentalist rave side of '606 hasn't been aired tonight, he is at times noisier than a mine caving in on itself, and pushes Mogwai every inch in terms of rampant discordance. To close his set, he bathes the whole of the Albert Hall in a marvellous hiss, the melody that was once so prominent now collapsing in to a grumbling hum around us. For a few moments I sit, happy that something like this is even happening in the RAH in the first place. Then, the Kid turns the sound off abruptly, before walking off as if nothing momentous had just happened whatsoever.
It had. But comparatively few people were there to see it, the lure of a bottle of readily available German lager at a (f**king sickening, if you ask me) £3.90 a bottle too tempting to resist. They come and find their seats for Mogwai though, oh yes they do. You see, each of them finds this whole situation as peculiar as I do.
A few people standing at the front treat it like a normal gig, indulging in lonesome jumping and whooping when they recognise what song the intro is going to lead to (to their geeky credit, this happens usually after just one single note is held for a few seconds - they know their Mogwai). Myself and many others however are happy to be seated and soak in the sheer occasion of seeing Mogwai in a place like this. I sit back (go chairs!) in the knowledge that the things that can ruin a Mogwai set, and have done for me in the past - crap sound, barely being able to stand up after two hours of it, getting jabbed in the arm with recklessly bandied about cigarettes - aren't going to happen tonight. All that will be delivered is Mogwai at their best.
People have suggested it my way that Mogwai these days are running out of ideas, struggling to find new things to do with their very very quiet then very very loud dynamic. It doesn't matter this evening for a few reasons, the first being that they manage to shift in volume so expertly that it never once feels like they're just reverting to tried and tested, safe, unadventurous methods to get their point across. The other is that things have changed - there are vocals here now. Not often mind, but they are there. Not just ones clouded in odd effects either. Right at the fore, there they are. Words. Choruses.
You don't need to own any Mogwai records to enjoy this. It might even be better that you don't. Confession time - hard copies of Mogwai albums? Despite many times enjoying seeing them, I own none. But I do know Mogwai, I'm experienced with what they're going to do to me, with the effect that their work will have on my body. You're not reading the words of an uninitiated fool, I count myself qualified to report because trust me, I know what to expect - and to exactly the right extent. But I'm absolutely adoring the way that I can't pinpoint exactly whereabouts anything is going to happen, where precisely beat structures are about to change, where I'm going to be blown back in to my chair by the sheer ferocity of it. Honest to gawd, when it gets deathly quiet (even if the sound being made is a particularly pretty one), I sit there in terror, not knowing when it's about to get painfully, crushingly loud. The tension is killing me, but it's what I came here for, and it's what Mogwai do best.
There's two hours of this. That doesn't suit some venues, but my Albert Hall seat is as comfy as they come right up until the second encore consisting, predictably, of all twenty minutes of 'My Father My King' (I disappear into the ether at around about 14m 47s, I think). I came surprised that I was about to glance upon one of my favourite live bands in a room such as this. I leave thinking they might do well to never play conventional gig venues again. In terms of majesty, occasion and grandeur, Mogwai matched the Albert Hall brick for brick.
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