Young Team

“Cause music is bigger than words and wider than pictures.” This was my submission, so it’s probably a bit obvious that I’m giving it five stars. If you can please listen to this album as it’s meant to be heard: loud as fuck. Here is my reasoning behind why I submitted this album: I wanted my choice to be a Scottish band, and a band that didn’t have any albums on the original list. I chose Mogwai because I think post-rock is a little underrepresented on the original list. We had Sigur Rós, Tortoise, and Slint, but it feels like Mogwai and Godspeed You! Black Emperor are obvious omissions. Young Team isn’t even my favorite Mogwai album; I would rank Come On Die Young and Happy Songs for Happy People above it. However, I think it’s their most important album, being their debut and their introduction to their quiet-loud dynamics and mesmerizing guitars. Hence, in my opinion it’s deserving of the list. The standout song from this album for me is “Mogwai Fear Satan,” probably their most epic song. Also, “Like Herod” needs a special mention. If you enjoyed this, please check out the rest of their music. Clearly, this is a biased view, but I don’t think they have a bad album.

I enjoyed this music, although during “Like Herod”, a rather loud and aggressive song, the brining bag on my turkey sprung a leak as I was lifting it and brine sprayed all over my kitchen while I frantically ran around searching for a means to stop the fountain of raw turkey liquid. “Like Herod” was playing loudly as I kept screaming at Siri to stop the music. Other than that, great!

I saw Mogwai about 10 years ago, and it was the loudest concert I've ever been to. Extremely impressive band, I was in need of a reminder. Thank you for submitting this to the list!

A sibling post-rock album to GY!BE's F♯A♯∞, Mogwai Young Team is the urban before the decay. Massive buildings of light and activity, streets of moving masses, the life of a city that never sleeps. Bigger than any one of us, Young Team captures a tower of sound and delivers it like a sonic freight train. But deep within, there's a certain beauty to this album. Real human connection, amidst the buzzing and chaos, displaying raw emotion in the clearing. Perhaps out of a restless need for closure, Mogwai finishes on a insurmountable level of noise and feedback that proves to be one of the finest post-rock songs in the entire genre. CONTENDER FOR THE LIST: I would like to see other post-rock heavy hitters on the list before considering this one (Swans, GY!BE, Talk Talk's Laughing Stock), but otherwise my bias is too strong to not add it to the list.

Fantastic album. It has some regular heavy post rock, some call intermezzo's and some more experimental songs. Amazing debut

It's about the fourth best Mogwai album. But it'd get five stars for Like Herod alone. Can't believe this is the first time Mogwai has come up. Feel like spending the next few years redoing all 1001 plus albums to add a few more!

A wonderful album, with moving instrumentals and engaging lyrics (or sampled conversations) when they used them. Lovely to hear Aidan Moffat show up, and talking Scots. I never realised until I heard "R U Still in 2 It" that I hadn't heard the word 'pictures' (to mean movies / cinema) in a song. It's these wee moments that make an album, and remind me why I give Scottish bands bonus points. Except I can't in this case, cos they are already getting five stars!

Great stuff, falls along the ranks of “stuff I might have underrated before I learned to like Radiohead,” which tbf is basically post-rock in a nutshell

I'm loving this Postrock revolution here at 1001. Mogwai are one of my faves and although this isn't my favourite of theirs it'll do. There's something about the genre that expresses things beyond words. Visionary.

In 1999, I almost crashed my car when the loud bit of "Like Herod" kicked in. Such a major omission from the original list and still so startlingly brilliant.

Another example for me of how you listen matters. I had hear of them before and listened to this record probably 3 or 4 years ago and thought - meh. Well, at that time I would have most likely listened to it through my little Bluetooth bose speaker. This time I made sure to listen to it through my main system. Wow. What a difference. This time it grabbed me from the opening right through the final note. I was blown away by the dynamics in this record. The distance between the lows and the highs, the soundstage the imaging. Wow. Just wow. And the songs grabbed me and I found myself waiting for what was coming next. My wife did say and one point for the upstairs “what the heck is that noise”. I think that’s the sign of a different and interesting sound in a record. Anyway, all this to say, listen to this on the best system you have at your disposal. And my system isn’t amazing by any stretch but it is able to be able to pick out the above. I’d love to hear this on a real audiophile grade system (whatever that is).

Melancholic, introspective, and very Scottish. Young Team is a quite bleak post-rock album that gets real damn loud at times, but there are also moments where these shimmering guitars break through the fog and everything seems wonderful I also wanted to share this incredible line from the album’s wikipedia page: The band took up pseudonyms for the liner notes on the album… John Cummings took the nickname Cpt. Meat after his obsession for eating chops

A classic 👏 Well deserving of a spot on this list with how synonymous Mogwai is with post rock

Good jam band vibes that sometimes go REAL HARD. A great time.

Really good with headphones!

It was a bit of a roller coaster ride for me between "this is very nice." and "jane! stop this crazy thing!".

Some really cool songs here that I want to revisit. “With portfolio” gave me a headache though. Very cool album

Rating: 6/10

I've known of these guys for a long time but never heard them. They're one of those groups that enjoys crossover appeal with card-carrying, no-nonsense metalheads and tbh that's always turned me off haha. From what I understand, it's going to be industrial/electronic sort of stuff, maybe like skinny puppy (also popular with the no-fun metal crowd). Ok it's post rock. It's... alright, I guess? I struggle to tell good from bad from average in this genre. It all does the same thing to my ears. But it's not a bad thing by any means. Just can't hold my interest - fine for a once off, though. Bit of jingle jangle, drawn out songs, intentional dynamics, etc. 3/5.

When I was living in France there was this guy at work, Xavier... Mogwai was his favorite band. Xavier was a nice dude. Anyway, I'll give it 3 stars because you brought back some memories... I'm not gay, shut up...

I was pleased with the music... Made for good drive time

I'm not really a big fan of songs that start off with a sample from TV or something similar, like a telephone call. Even with Pink Floyd's Young Lust, they wait until the end. Overall, it's difficult to keep my attention to this album. I get a great drum riff, followed by a dishwasher?

So I complained to some of my friends that this album is too much endless droning for my tastes. One of them mentioned that this is why she doesn't enjoy TOOL. I really liked them when I was younger so I decided to relisten to some of their greatest hits. Man that washed this right out of my brain. 2/5 on the album since it's not like offensive to my ears but absolutely nothing to latch onto, but thanks for reminding me that TOOL rocks i guess?

One of those albums where you have to check if your Bluetooth earphones are connected properly after 30 seconds because nothing has happened yet. Sure it’s got “dynamics” but the downs are boring and the ups are stressful.

This was pretty cool. Reminded me a bit of that band whose music was used in the show Friday Night Lights, Explosions in the Sky I think they were called. 3.5 stars, rounding up to 4.

Yes, more of this please.

This is pretty interesting and I can’t think of a comparable. Mostly instrumental rock telling a story with great use of sudden dynamic shifts and long periods of groove. Keeps you with it

Great post-rock debut album with fantastic soundscapes.

Pretty interesting release. At first it seems a bit aimless with Long Way from Home, but Like Herod starts to kick it up several notches by delivering an energy and groove that immediately works. Though there is some filler material, there's enough that works, exploring different tempos and energy levels, but still drives a great vibe (Katrien, Tracy and Mogwai Fear Satan are all strong). Enjoyed!

Gorgeous post-rock. Loses me around "With Portfolio", which was so noisy that it forced me to remove my earbuds until it passed. The album never quite recovers from there, but I enjoyed it enough to probably check out the other material from these guys. Favorite tracks: "Yes! I Am A Long Way From Home", "Mogwai Fear Satan"

Why did no one tell me this is what Mogwai sound like

Not bad. Some good sound

Pretty damn good

Rumblingly, forebodingly dark – mostly  in a good and contemplative way – holds up well.

Background music. It's pleasingly noodly, although I can't imagine anyone actually being engaged by it.

Mogwai is not a fast-food dish. I've tried for years to actually 'get' this, and I still can't fully embrace it. I WANT to love this band, and listening to the fantastic closing track of this album (Mogwai Fear Satan) I again wonder why many of their other songs do not have the same effect on me. I have yet to find the key that fully unlocks Mogwai for me. I will keep trying.

didn't really do it for me

Interesting

I've danced around the periphery of this band for some time as a casual fan of prog, but hadn't given one of their LPs a full listen. This was a mostly fun ride, and at times felt almost theatrical which made for a fun listen. My personal preference would've been to cut down on some of the quieter interludes that bulk up the track runtimes – this band excels at intense technical passages, and it felt those only got 40% of the limelight relative to the less-novel quiet bits.

This didn't do a lot for me. A lot of electronic noise drone ambient meandering, a lot of vocals in the "mumbling through a bad intercom" vein (and even some real stale tricks like running them backwards). I didn't hate it but I wouldn't seek more.

Enjoyed this. Strategic uses of tension, noise and quiet, all to brilliant effect. I did find myself wishing for a good vocal on some of the songs, but that's a minor critique. Fave Songs: Summer (Priority Version), Yes! I Am a Long Way from Home, Tracy, Like Herod, A Cheery Wave from Stranded Youngsters

Ágætt

So, Mogwai are a post-rock band that makes lengthy guitar-based instrumental pieces. Huh. I had assumed they were another 90s indie band. This is more interesting than I had assumed, but not really my thing. That said, it has lovely textures. Rating: 2.5 Playlist track: Mogwai Fear Satan Date listened: 29/11/24

Shoegaze ambient post rock type stuff. Not bad.

This mostly hard rock instrumental album had an interesting playing style and mood overall. Very laid back but also a bit aggressive with the distorted guitars. Some songs dragged a bit and it. It was a pretty cool album to hear but not sure how much I’d revisit it. 5.9/10

This one made no impression either way on me

Another band I've never heard of although funnily enough I saw an ad for Rough Trade doing a listening party for a new album of theirs so they still are active. Unsurprisingly this follows my common complaint of being too long. For long drawn out songs, they just weren't interesting enough for me to care. I'd say cut 20 minutes and you'd have a nice solid album. The long drawn out songs just felt tiring. My personal rating: 2/5 My rating relative to the list: 3/5 Should have this been included on the original list? Sure why not. Replace some 90s mediocrity with this and I wouldn't complain. At least this band has some impact on music.

Very cool atmospheric rock vibes. I dig it.

I'm a fairly casual Mogwai fan. It's not my favourite of theirs.

Instrumentals were cool, expressive, groovy, but repetitive.

Mogwai never really crossed my radar except for knowing their name from OTF lore down the years, and I've not really been into post-rock, so I didn't really know what to expect from Young Team, and I guess it's a mixed bag. I dig the huge loud sound and the blend of gentler, quieter moments to make those loud explosions really resonate are cool, but the instrumental nature/very very minimalist vocals don't particularly work for me at the end of it all. It's all a bit too long as well, I like large chunks of Herod and Mogwai Fear Satan but there's no reason for both tracks to be 10+ minutes in length, though the latter is the best track overall and is absolutely fucking thunderous at its best moments, and I adore that. I'll give it a 3/5 because, like I say, some of it really delivers what I enjoy, but it leaves a few boxes unticked.

Mogwai is fine, but they're my least favorite of the "big 90s post-rock" bands. Not really sure why. Probably because they haven't perfected that buildup->payoff formula as well as the others. Some songs are way too much buildup for not enough payoff. Most notably "Mogwai Fear Satan" which barely goes anywhere despite being 16 minutes long. Still enjoyable though, and I definitely agree that the list needed more post-rock.

May 3, 2025 HL: “Mogwai Fear Satan”, “Yes!”, “Tracy” The spoken word about making up a ‘bit of a sketch’ reminded me of the Limmy Show. Probably just that Glasgow accent. It has a beautiful finale, the question that I won’t quite be able to answer this afternoon is: “Was the journey worth it?” It was definitely heavier and noisier than I expected, but I guarantee there will be times where I’m looking for that dense atmosphere. Just doesn’t happen to be today

Well, they know how to play a guitar, right? I enjoyed it, but much more as background music rather than something special.

Slow, melancholic, adjective nr.3. Listened to it loud as fuck as instructed. This is an album that requires a certain mindset in order to fully immerse yourself in it. With post-rock projects like this I feel the usual objective is to pack every thought and feeling you can possibly have inside of your head, let it run wild, create pressure and absolutely get lost in it all to the point that it's almost a jumpscare when it finally ends. This didn't achieve that for me. it was enjoyable tho

Why did they decide to record the vocals in another room? I just really don't understand this modern Scottish music.....it just doesn't translate on this side of the pond.... Admittedly upon second playthrough it started to make a bit more sense. Favorite songs: Mogwai Fear Satan, King Herod, Yes! I Am A Long Way From Home Least favorite songs: With Portfolio 3/5

I had heard of Mogwai through reference to Gremlins but had never listened to them. I'm actually surprised that it was just music, which is fine but I'm disappointed that there are no vocals making the music just an ambient background while I was doing my activities. It doesn't leave me with a great "taste" for what I had known about them.

Average

Atmospheric instrumentals. This is not my thing.

Almost felt like listening to a distorted ham radio and I wasn't the biggest fan of that.

A little too long with too little substance

Música un tanto experimental y de ambiente un tanto relajado. En su mayor parte, instrumental. Estilo de sonido continuo con alguna estridencia, que no desentona del todo. No me ha producido un gran descubrimiento.

Post-rock, noise rock, instrumental rock. Ruido. Y lo que no es ruido es un rollo. Un 1.