Mogwai Land First UK No. 1 Album With As the Love Continues

Mogwai’s As the Love Continues is the No. 1 album in the United Kingdom. It’s the first-ever chart-topper from the Scottish rock group in the band’s 25-year career. Mogwai beat out grime artist Ghetts for the top spot. Fans of the band (including noted music fan and Lord of the Rings actor Elijah Wood) pushed to support the group in the lead-up to the final weekly chart being published today. Find a photo of Mogwai with their award for going No. 1 below.

“We’re unbelievably happy to have the No. 1 album in the UK,” Mogwai frontman Stuart Braithwaite said in a statement. “We want to thank everyone at Rock Action Records—both of you—and mostly to thank everyone who has bought, downloaded and streamed the album, and supported us over the last week, and the last 25 years. It’s something we’re amazed by. We’re taken aback by everyone’s support, kindness and generosity.”

Braithwaite continued:

It is 25 years this week we released our first single “Tuner/Lower,” the first release on our own label Rock Action Records. We didn’t start the band or the label to get into the charts. None of us ever envisaged either the band or the label being in a position where having a No. 1 record would be a possibility.

We started the label with a loan of £400 from my now-brother in law. [Drummer] Martin [Bulloch]’s folks generously helped us out by paying for the studio to record the songs. We were just kids that wanted to make an amazing noise and get our record played on John Peel. Amazingly John did play the record, and one thing led to another to get us to the point we’re at now. It’s been an incredible journey making music together over the last quarter century, taking us to places we never dreamed of and getting to play our music to more people than we ever imagined.

As the Love Continues is Mogwai’s 10 studio album, following 2017’s Every Country’s Sun. The band contributed the soundtrack to the action film Kin in 2018. 

Read “Looking at 20 Years of Mogwai” over on the Pitch.