TAS In Session: Mew

 AUDIO CLIP

A fresh face on the scene to many casual U.S. music fans, Mew actually played their first show together as a band back in 1994. Those who have only heard of Mew’s music in recent years can be forgiven, however, as the band’s first two albums were barely heard by anyone outside of their hometown of Copenhagen, Denmark. That all changed in 2003 with the release of their third album Frengers, a critical success that earned Mew “Album of the Year” and “Band of the Year” honors at the Danish Music Critics Awards. It also propelled them onto the international music radar for the first time in their career.

It’s difficult to categorize Mew’s sound, which is part of the reason the band is so interesting. It’s their uniqueness and originality that sets them apart from so many other “indie” rock bands on the current scene. There is a shoegazer element to their music that is reminiscent of Spiritualized, a new prog vibe not unlike Mogwai, and a more straight-ahead guitar-driven indie rock sound a la Malajube.

The band spent a couple of years working on their new album No More Stories … and it’s a worthy follow-up to their previous record And The Glass Handed Kites. Not as dark and a bit more upbeat, the album finds the trio - Jonas Bjerre, Bo Madsen, and Silas Utke Graae Jørgensen- more confident than ever in their talent. Their studio work continues to evolve and their live shows are inspired and uplifting (part of the reason Trent Reznor asked them to open for Nine Inch Nails during the "Wave Goodbye" tour in New York City).