New Mogwai Single Pays Tribute to Ryuichi Sakamoto

Indie rockers Mogwai pay tribute to the Japanese musician and composer Ryuichi Sakamoto with their new single “Ritchie Sacramento,” the second song to be taken from their forthcoming tenth studio album As the Love Continues.

Featuring quietly melodic vocals, “Ritchie Sacramento” oscillates between moments of tranquility and disorder. The music video’s director Sam Wiehl, who has previously collaborated with Ladytron, Forest Swords and the Valentino fashion house and created a whole first person multi-level computer game for the song, forged the music video’s animations and narratives.

 “The title came from a misunderstanding a friend of ours had about how to say Ryuichi Sakamoto,” says Mogwai’s Stuart Braithwaite.

The lyrics were inspired by a story Bob Nastanovich shared about his friend and bandmate David Berman, who proclaimed “rise crystal spear” as he threw a shovel at a sports car. The song is dedicated to all the musician friends we’ve lost over the years.

“Ritchie Sacramento” follows previous single “Dry Fantasy.”

Mogwai will premiere a very special live performance of As the Love Continues, performed and recorded at Tramway in their hometown of Glasgow. The performance will be broadcast worldwide at 8pm GMT on Feb. 13. Directed by the band’s long term collaborator Antony Crook, the broadcast will be the first opportunity to hear the new album in full alongside highlights from the band’s formidable back catalogue. Tickets are on sale now and available at www.mogwai.scot.

The album release follows on Feb. 19 via Temporary Residence Ltd., and is available for pre-order in various formats, including digital, CD, double vinyl, a special edition box set that includes the CD, colored 2xLP, special single vinyl pressing of five album demo tracks, and a photo book.

The band recorded the album earlier this year with producer Dave Fridmann and features contributions from Atticus Ross on “Midnight Flit” and Colin Stetson on “Pat Stains.”

As the Love Continues will arrive 25 years on from the release of the band’s debut single “Tuner”/”Lower.”

As the Love Continues was originally planned to be recorded in the States, but the pandemic led to a relocation to Worcestershire with Fridmann appearing like “an Orwellian oppressor” over the sessions.

Unable to perform the album for the time being, Braithwaite hopes the music can take you from somewhere different to where you are “unless you are somewhere really amazing and then why are you listening to some weird music like this?”

Photo: Antony Crook