GLASGOW's music scene has long been throwing out enough cult bands to make bedsit guitarists across the UK seethe with envy - from the bar-room poetry of Arab Strap to the epic rock noise of Aereo-gramme.

Mogwai played a huge part in that - with their remarkable and influential 1997 debut album Young Team. However, like many bands who make such an explosive debut, they've struggled to escape its shadow, the limitations of their slow-burning instrumental sound proving a straitjacket on subsequent albums. And unlike Radiohead, Mogwai lack the guts to break from their successful formula.

Once, that Happy Songs title would have been full of bitter irony at the uncompromising music within - now you suspect they might mean it. This is a lush, mellow take on the Mogwai sound, their trademark hypnotic instrumentals threaded with tasteful string arrangements and choral synths, with only polite hints of the jaw-dropping guitar crescendos of old. It's pleasant background music, but little else - a bit of a cop-out for a once revolutionary band.

Fellow Glaswegians Biffy Clyro may have the silliest name in rock, but it is being dropped heavily in the music press. Pitched somewhere between Idlewild and the aforementioned Aereogramme, this likeable arty and melodic three-piece wobble between real inspiration and indie mediocrity, on a record which, although a quantum leap from their disappointing debut, and definitely a grower, doesn't quite fulfil the hype.

Updated: 10:56 Thursday, June 19, 2003