HAPPY SONGS FOR HAPPY PEOPLE

Continuing the experimental flair of "Rock Action," this fourth MOGWAI album is melocholy, melodious, and maniacal. Even more ironically titled than it's predecessor, "Happy Songs for Happy People" is a moody bag of sadness, but pulled off beautifully. There are effects- laden drums, strings, keyboard, and more effects than you can name. The titles do a good job of hinting at the album's feel - "Stop Coming to My House," "Hunted by a Freak," and "Kids Will Be Skeletons" communicate loating, fear, and nihilism, respectively, and it's all done without words. There are no songs, save some indecipherable singing on two songs, by use of a vocoder. And then there's "Ratts of the Capital." If ever a song exemplified the phrase "guitar chatharsis," this song is it. Recommended for fans of highly electronic music made organically - i.e. electronic, but not computer.