It's a bumper start to 2023 for fans of Scottish musicKevin Buckle

Exciting times for lovers of Scottish music started this week with the return of The Delgados and their tour ending with a sold-out hometown gig in Glasgow’s Barrowlands.

Reviews were maybe unexpectedly ecstatic but from what I have heard well deserved. While vocalist Emma Pollock went on to have a successful solo career there had always been a hankering among fans for the band’s return and they weren’t disappointed.

While never having been away Mogwai’s first two albums have been unavailable on vinyl for some time so there was much delight from fans when it was announced at the end of last year that that both albums would be released on coloured vinyl on 10 February.

Their 1997 debut Young Team comes on sky-blue vinyl and is housed in a gatefold sleeve. Released on Chemikal Underground the original recording engineer for the album, Paul Savage, whose production credits include Franz Ferdinand and The Twilight Sad, has remastered the album for this special reissue. There is also a CD version available.

The Delgados go down a storm at the Barrowlands (Picture: @Paul4Jags)

The second album Come On Die Young which followed two years later is also released this time on white vinyl. I was lucky enough to have the original photo for the Young Team sleeve on loan when I held the Scottish music exhibition The Only Fun In Town at the Fruitmarket Gallery in 2017 and it also went on to be a part of the National Museum of Scotland’s Rip It Up exhibition the following year.

Avalanche will publish its annual revised top 100 best-selling Scottish albums next week and both these albums feature in the top ten so it is excellent timing indeed.

Mogwai in fact have 15 albums in contention for the top 100 as the chart is finalised with Belle and Sebastian, Frightened Rabbit, The Twilight Sad, Biffy Clyro, Idlewild, Camera Obscura, Ballboy, Arab Strap and Cocteau Twins all featuring strongly.

Some artists have suffered as their albums are no longer available while others have benefited from reissues and for the first time there is the possibility that the first three Belle and Sebastian albums will not hold on to the top three spots as they have done since the chart was first revealed almost ten years ago.

Mogwai's debut album, Young Team, is released on coloured vinyl early next month

Following hot on the heels of these releases two weeks later is the greatly anticipated reissue of the Friends Again album Trapped and Unwrapped. Originally released in 1984 it has now been remastered by Paul McGeechan who later went on to be part of Love and Money along with fellow Friends Again band members James Grant and Stuart Kerr.

Friends Again’s other vocalist Chris Thomson went on to form The Bathers who had three of their albums Lagoon Blues, Sunpowder and Kelvingrove Baby all reissued on vinyl in 2020.

The album comes on an independent shops only blue vinyl as well as on CD and Avalanche will have all the new releases mentioned as well as stocking The Bathers albums. Other record shops of course are available.

This week also sees releases from other Scottish artists with the reissue of Hamish Hawk’s Heavy Elevator on CD, the BMX Bandits’ music for the film Dreaded Light and the first album for 13 years from Edinburgh-based band The Zephyrs For Sapphire Needle.

Certainly a great start to the year for Scottish music!