A Thursday evening it was, a few years back now and we’d made the mistake of heading to Minehead (or at least nearby Taunton) a night early. Meeting our small band of fellow festival fans at a local pub we thought a pint of local cider, a pie and a return to our cheap hotel room would be the way the night would run.

“What time do you close?” the barman was asked.

“What time do you want to leave?” he replied.

Despite the inevitable 3am cab journey and sleeping on the floor of a shared room, the excitement for that ATP was so strong that coffees were being supped by 6.30am on the Friday. Struggling with exhaustion a little we made our way to Butlin’s and rejoiced to be in the early afternoon company of like-minded music lovers and twats in that Sonic Youth t-shirt that all the twats wear.

It was cold and drizzly and we could hear the sea slap the shore.

We ran straight into a large group of friends and acquaintances and the day become ragged at the edges. Pleased as kids we were at the air hockey tables, laughed like sea mad pirates at the strange chance of us all meeting like that when no plan had been formed and the trip not discussed between us.

Then there were The Constantines I believe… wonderful rock ‘n’ roll and Replacements racket.

And maybe a chalet break, a bar-bound burt of brevity and a return for Mono. Never heard them, never heard of them. None of us. You may as well take a look at the Japanese 4-piece who have quietly stalked on to the stage, black hair in their faces, smoke billowing around them, a smattering applause from an early-on-a-Friday-who-are-ya crowd. And then Takaakira Goto strikes a gentle chord on his Fender…

On their 6th full length studio outing and their first in a long while away from the stern but loving guiding hand of Our Glorious Leader Steve Albini, Mono have taken the musical lessons that were writ large on their 2010 live album collaboration with Wordless Music Orchestra. The WMO accompany Mono throughout here, and it appears that this marriage represents the culmination of the journey the Tokyo natives began as MBV-aping post-rockers on Under The Pipal Tree and continued as they added instruments, chamber orchestras and, most importantly, applied much more savvy, emotive and complex structures to their twin themes of obsession: heart-filling joy and soul-crushing sadness, the twin themes of all the best rock bands, right?

Of course, like all the best rock bands they’re not really a rock band at all and this 5 track double album (the shortest cut here is 8:10, the lengthiest an awe-inspiring 14:02) is a huge step in Mono’s progression towards creating the ultimate visual and emotional audio experience. It’s perhaps best to think of the songs as movements rather than tracks, of their contemporaries as modern classical composers rather than check-shirted hipsters and the experience of their music a kind of touching-the-void swell of emotion rather than a cold or cynical evaluation of their musicianship (which is, by the way, astounding) or current relevance (they have either none or all, up to you).

In the press for the album Goto talks of it being “a gift from child to parent. While everything else continues to change, this love remains a constant throughout time”.

To fulfill these heady ambitions we are immersed firstly in the gradient swell of ‘Legend’ which combines a terrifically sad set of minor chord sequences with rousing, explosive, arms-in-the-air-towards-heaven instrumentation and sea-change key changes that leave the listener breathless. On a sidenote, it also sounds like they wrote it while listening to Game of Thrones. Cool.

Despite their seemingly full and fruitful move into the neo-classical they never abandon the guitars that they rode there, with the exotic architecture of the rich, lush ‘Nostalgia’ punctuated by Hideki Suematsu’s tickle-scratched runs and Tamaki Kunishi’s understated, punctuating bass.

What perhaps stands out most here is the way Yasunori Takada’s drumming forms the spare foundation for much of the clashing alternate waves of minimalism and fullness of sound. The work on the heart-heavy ‘Dream Odyssey’ is reminiscent of ex-Red House Painters man Anthony Koutsus, a crushed military style of timekeeping that accentuates the lilt of teary tragedy that fills the lungs of the music.

Some may find that ‘Unseen Harbour’ is just a little too bombastic – but you’ll be goddamned if you don’t feel a chest swell as those strings rise and swoop down. Its more sedate sections are wonderfully natural sounding, deceivingly simplistic and directly moving – should you be open to such things.

‘A Quiet Place (Together We Go)’ offers the celebration of life and lament of death that any decent album should close on. As the cello strings pop and tickle the heart strings, as the cymbals and gongs scream in time with the rising, all-empowering, all-encompassing roar of orchestral sound don’t be surprised if you hold your breath for a second as the whole thing comes to a pinched and smiling halt.

… So the chord was struck and the room filled with growing, reverberating sound. Within moments of the first song beginning we were held, enraptured; by the time of the debut crescendo of the set jaws were slowly slipping open. Eyes close, memories are set aflame and images of warmth, hope and perfection dance in our soaking hearts. We are brave enough to look around once or twice – don’t worry, you aren’t the only one that’s crying. Who’da thought it possible, in a Butlin’s in Minehead?