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While Mogwai once seemed too ambitious for their own good, Mr. Beast perfectly distills the essence of the band's raison d'etre. [Apr 2006, p.214]
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100A superb album.
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A monster of a record. [4 Mar 2006, p.31]
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90Compelling and emotionally charged.
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90Ten years after they first assaulted us, Mogwai remain as vital as ever.
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Unlike previous releases, when we were taken on several rides within a solitary track, the thrills and tempo changes have been stretched out to album length, making this offering essentially a forty-three-minute song, with each track becoming a spike or dip along the way.
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Proof that smart music can be fierce, too. [10 Mar 2006, p.68]
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80There are no huge surprises on this album - it sounds and feels exactly how you'd expect - but somehow "Mr Beast" still seems vital and forward thinking.
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The revelation of Mr. Beast is that it's the closest Mogwai have come to capturing the raw intensity of their live power. [#13, p.93]
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80Delivers on the melodic promise of 2001's Rock Action, teetering between art-bruised fragility during its slower, gentler moments and flashes of stereo-buckling metal. [Mar 2006, p.93]
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Immediate without sounding dumbed-down, Mr. Beast shows the band at the peak of their powers.
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80While the sense of danger that characterised 1997's Mogwai Young Team or 2001's Rock Action might have abated, Mr Beast shows a band who have lost none of their bark or their bite. [Mar 2006, p.108]
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80It's all a lesson in taking the rough with the smooth, from the best teachers around.
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Far from a drop off in coherence, Mr. Beast is just another stop on a long, strange, satisfying trip.
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80Sure it's louder, but it's too self-disciplined and too well-arranged. [#19, p.96]
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80It is hard to say which side of Mogwai is more moving, the quietly beautiful or the transcendently loud, but the great thing about Mr. Beast is that you don't have to decide.
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80Mr. Beast isn’t Mogwai’s most challenging or daring record, but it might be its most beautiful or powerful.
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80At this point, Mogwai have learned enough from their mistakes and built enough on their strengths that Mr. Beast could be considered by all means a flawless record.
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The result is that we have a transitory album, but also a typically beautiful and subtle one.
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With its plodding tempo, slow-woven guitars, melancholy piano chords and moments of crushing loudness, "Friend of the Night" is representative of much of the album, but Mr. Beast's best bits are those that dare to be different.
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70A beautifully tense and thoughtful record.
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70For the most part, "Mr. Beast" finds Mogwai quite comfortable in a genre they've helped define.
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A solid – albeit unadventurous - long-player, which refines instead of redefines and consolidates more than it innovates.
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70Mr. Beast is by far Mogwai’s most accessible album to date, teetering between epic hard rock and a melodic, driven vocal delivery.
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68Mr. Beast's shortcomings lie not with what's present, but with what's missing. Mogwai are capable of tremendous beauty, poignant gloom, and ear-splitting sonic pyrotechnics, but only transcend when they combine each of these elements. Here, they rarely give themselves enough building room to conjoin these moods and styles.
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If you like Mogwai for the sounds they make, for their instrumental dynamic and ebbing/flowing moodiness, you'll probably like Mr Beast - there's certainly little to object to. But if you love Mogwai... perhaps Mr Beast isn't for you.
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60Mr Beast, by Mogwai's normally formidable standards, underwhelms. [Apr 2006, p.96]
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A more straightforward affair than previous works, and as such suffers from predictability.
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58They vacillate between flotational devices and skull-crushers. [Apr 2006, p.91]
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There’s little to differentiate Mr. Beast from Happy Songs, and less to recommend it in the face of Mogwai’s potent catalog.
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50Too often Mr. Beast is dire sounding and dull, and nearing deadweight. [May 2006, p.86]
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A premature nostalgia trip: a journey back to college radio at the end of the '90s. [Apr/May 2006, p.106]
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Beast lumbers instead of flows.
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Simplicity doesn't make Mr. Beast unpleasant, just dumb.
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While Mr. Beast may not sound as fine Happy Songs... or Rock Action, it no doubt kicks ass live.
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Their efforts at stretching boundaries falter because they have inscribed themselves within such narrow aesthetic parameters, hitting a fourth chord feels like a massive achievement.
User score distribution:
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Positive: 21 out of 23
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Mixed: 1 out of 23
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Negative: 1 out of 23
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9
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CarlS10
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OttoZ9Hypnotic and interesting, artful and always cool.