''Happy Songs for Happy People'' is the fourth

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

by Scottish

post-rock Post-rock is a form of experimental rock characterized by a focus on exploring textures and timbre over traditional rock song structures, chords, or riffs. Post-rock artists are often instrumental, typically combining rock instrumentation with ...

band

Mogwai Mogwai () are a Scottish post-rock band, formed in 1995 in Glasgow. The band consists of Stuart Braithwaite (guitar, vocals), Barry Burns (guitar, piano, synthesizer, vocals), Dominic Aitchison (bass guitar), and Martin Bulloch (drums). Mogw ...

Overview

''Happy Songs for Happy People'' represents a further evolution of Mogwai's toned down, more electronic sound: all songs are based on

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gui ...

s and live drums, but

synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...

s are used frequently and often take the main stage on this album, with strings and piano also making the occasional appearance. Mogwai's usual vocalist

Stuart Braithwaite Stuart Leslie Braithwaite (born 10 May 1976) is a Scottish musician, singer and songwriter. He is the guitarist of post-rock band Mogwai, with whom he has recorded ten studio albums. He is also a member of the British alternative rock supergroup ...

does not sing on this album.

Barry Burns Barry Burns is a Scottish musician best known for his work with post-rock band Mogwai. Early life Burns went to Cardinal Newman High School in Bellshill before enrolling with the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow, taking ...

("Hunted by a Freak", "Killing All the Flies") and John Cummings ("Boring Machines Disturbs Sleep") accept vocal duties.

Release

The CD release of ''Happy Songs for Happy People'' contains a demo version of

Cubase Cubase is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed by Steinberg for music and MIDI recording, arranging and editing. The first version, which was originally only a MIDI sequencer and ran on the Atari ST computer, was released in 1989. Cut-dow ...

and the individual tracks for each instrument in "Hunted by a Freak" allowing remixing and reconstructing of the song. The pre-release

MP3 MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany, with support from other digital scientists in the United States and elsewhere. Origin ...

s of the album circulating on the net had a sample of ''

Happy Tree Friends ''Happy Tree Friends'' is an American adult animated web series created by Aubrey Ankrum, Rhode Montijo, and Kenn Navarro, and developed by Montijo, Navarro, and Jeremy Viet Duong for Mondo Media. The show had achieved a cult following on ...

'' cartoon main theme mixed in at the end of the last track. A computer-animated video was released for the song "Hunted by a Freak", depicting a person throwing

pet A pet, or companion animal, is an animal kept primarily for a person's company or entertainment rather than as a working animal, livestock, or a laboratory animal. Popular pets are often considered to have attractive appearances, intelligence, ...

s to their death. In 2009 it was awarded a

gold certification Music recording certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped, sold, or streamed a certain number of units. The threshold quantity varies by type (such as album, single, music video) and by nation or territory (see ...

from the

Independent Music Companies Association The Independent Music Companies Association (IMPALA), originally the Independent Music Publishers and Labels Association, is a non-profit trade association established in 2000 to help European independent record labels represent their agenda a ...

which indicated sales of at least 100,000 copies throughout Europe. The song "I Know You Are But What Am I?" is used as the closing of Episode 8, Season 1 of the TV show ''

Person of Interest "Person of interest" is a term used by law enforcement in the United States, Canada, and other countries when identifying someone possibly involved in a criminal investigation who has not been arrested or formally accused of a crime. It has no leg ...

'' and also appears on ''

The Wicker Man ''The Wicker Man'' is a 1973 British folk horror film directed by Robin Hardy and starring Edward Woodward, Britt Ekland, Diane Cilento, Ingrid Pitt, and Christopher Lee. The screenplay by Anthony Shaffer, inspired by David Pinner's 1967 nov ...

'' motion picture soundtrack. The song "Kids Will Be Skeletons" was featured in the 2015 video game ''

Life Is Strange ''Life Is Strange'' (abbreviated ''LIS'') is a series of primarily episodic graphic adventure games published by Square Enix's European subsidiary. Created by Dontnod Entertainment, the series debuted with the eponymous first installment, ...

'' as well as episodes of the

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fil ...

series ''

After Life The afterlife (also referred to as life after death) is a purported existence in which the essential part of an individual's identity or their stream of consciousness continues to live after the death of their physical body. The surviving esse ...

''.

Track listing

Personnel

;Mogwai *

Dominic Aitchison Dominic Aitchison (born 11 October 1976) is a Scottish bassist and songwriter. He is best known as the bassist and founding member of post-rock band Mogwai. Aside from Mogwai, he also played bass guitar in Crippled Black Phoenix and Stage Blood ...

–

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

–

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

Martin Bulloch Martin Bulloch (born 14 August 1974) is a Scottish musician, best known for being the drummer in the rock band Mogwai. Early life Bulloch was born in Bellshill, North Lanarkshire, Scotland. He was once a cook at a Chinese restaurant in East K ...

–

drums A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other Percussion instrument, auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair o ...

– guitar,

keyboard Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Musi ...

, vocoder on "Hunted by a Freak" and "Killing All the Flies" * John Cummings – guitar,

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

, vocals on "Boring Machines Disturbs Sleep" ;Additional musicians *

Luke Sutherland Luke Sutherland (born 1971) is a Scottish novelist and musician. A full-time member of two independent bands and an occasional member of Mogwai, active also as a music producer, he has also published a number of written works. Biography Sutherla ...

–

violin The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

on "Killing All the Flies" and "Stop Coming to My House", guitar on "Ratts of the Capital" * Caroline Barber –

cello The cello ( ; plural ''celli'' or ''cellos'') or violoncello ( ; ) is a Bow (music), bowed (sometimes pizzicato, plucked and occasionally col legno, hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually intonation (music), t ...

on "Hunted By a Freak", "Moses? I Amn't" and "Golden Porsche" * Donald Gillian – cello on "Killing All the Flies" * Scott Dickinson – viola on "Killing All the Flies" * Greg Lawson – violin on "Killing All the Flies" ;Production *

Tony Doogan Tony Doogan is a Scottish record producer who runs Castle of Doom Studios in Glasgow. He is perhaps best known for his work with Mogwai and Belle & Sebastian. He has also worked with numerous other artists, including Teenage Fanclub, the Delgados, ...

–

production Production may refer to: Economics and business * Production (economics) * Production, the act of manufacturing goods * Production, in the outline of industrial organization, the act of making products (goods and services) * Production as a stati ...

recording A record, recording or records may refer to: An item or collection of data Computing * Record (computer science), a data structure ** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity ** Boot sector or boot record, ...

, mixing *Mogwai – production *Michael "Frango" Bannister – assistant

engineering Engineering is the use of scientific method, scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad rang ...

*Gavin Lawrie – assistant engineering *Adam Nunn – mastering ;Artwork and design *Uncontrollable Urge – cover *Divine Inc –

design A design is a plan or specification for the construction of an object or system or for the implementation of an activity or process or the result of that plan or specification in the form of a prototype, product, or process. The verb ''to design'' ...

Charts

References

{{Authority control 2003 albums Mogwai albums Matador Records albums PIAS Recordings albums Albums produced by Tony Doogan