From the Vaults Friday Mogwai Young Team 1997

The Year: 1997
The Album: Mogwai, Young Team
Who it Influenced: Explosions in the Sky, Efterklang, The Twilight Sad, Fuck Buttons, generations of post-rockers

There's no singing. Well, almost not. There's zany song titles. And there's huge, building crescendos and dramatic dynamic shifts from quiet-to-loud; with dudes stomping on effects pedals and reaching for catharsis amidst songs sprawling on for a dozen-odd minutes.

It is, indeed, a Mogwai album. But, as their first, Young Team is treated with an unyielding reverence by all those who fell under its spell; standing, both in its contemporary day and 15 years later, as one of the definitive examples of post-rock, back when that term carried cachet.

I tend to think that 1999's Come On Die Young is the far superior LP; catching the young Scottish outfit whilst still on their ascent, yet refining their ideas into experiments more yielding and interesting, and carrying with it a greater edge.

But I understand why the world —beyond the simple fact that it was their debut— tends to prize Young Team as Mogwai's definitive disc. After all, if the appeal of this band is hearing them go from really, really quiet to really, really loud, then "King Herod" and "Mogwai Fear Satan" is that idea reduced to the simple essential.

• Full review: Mogwai, Young Team