Spoon & Rafter [CD]

Mojave 3's founding members are vocalist/guitarist Neil Halstead, bassist/vocalist Rachel Goswell, and drummer Ian McCutcheon, members of definitive shoegazers Slowdive. The band broke cover in 1995, when a six-track demo impressed 4AD sufficiently to offer them a deal. Never ones to sit still, Spoon and Rafter marked a shift for Mojave 3. While still containing echoes of singer-songwriters and alt-country, the record represents a Technicolor expansion of their palette that utilizes electronics, glockenspiels, melodica, and Beatlesque production. "It's quite a bonkers album, really," says Ian. "By that stage we had our own studio again on the north Cornish coast in the UK. We had time to pick up different instruments and just faff around. It was quite a process, but it's my favorite record we did. " "We sort of entered our Beach Boys phase of Mojave 3," says Neil, "where we became more interested in different instrumentation and a fuller sound. Thanks to Mark [Van Hoen] it was the first time we used an early Pro Tools system to edit stuff together, so some of the tracks are much longer and more orchestrated, like 'Bluebird of Happiness,' which has three different sections that were all recorded separately and then chopped together. "Mojave 3's own myth has grown, resulting in their records being some of 4AD's most requested reissues of the last decade. With these 2026 reissues putting all five albums in print once again, perhaps it's Mojave 3's time to rise from the ashes and fly once again.