[Skuj]

Some early reviewers (it leaked) are very happy.

[Skuj]

I stole this review from the internet because I like the style:


01 Screenshot 8:05
- begins with a simple bass riff that carries the song throughout
- hypnotic mantra
- builds and builds into a wall of sound
- HERE. NOW. HERE. NOW!
- very much a intro track that brings you into their brand of hell

02 Just A Little Boy 12:40
- laid back groove. ominous and brooding.
- "I'm just a lil boy!!!" Michael sounds so fucking creepy during this line!
- evil laughter (sounds cool in headphones, possibly Annie Clark?)
- last two minutes things begin to pay off with small explosions
- one of my favs simply because of Gira's spooky as fuck vocal delivery

03 A Little God 7:08
- surprisingly optimistic! especially coming out of the last track
- jangly psychotic piano lurking in the distance
- you could almost dance to this
- horn/synth explosions near the end!!! FUCK THIS RULES!!!!

04 Sun Toussaint 34:05
- this is my goddamn JAM!!!!!!!
- opens with a brutal fucking thrashing, relentlessly beating the shit out of you
- when the lashes are done and all is calm, Michael begins his monk-like chant
- I'm drunk now
- ten minutes in and things begin to intensify
- SUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNN
- My neighbors officially hate me because this shit is so loud
- after the torment, things die down with toy instruments and horse noises
- FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.....DOOOOOOMMMM
- noise bliss into referee whistles....the bass is building and bringing us back in
- TOUSSAINT! (there's 11 mins left! wtf! my brain can't handle this!)
- nice little tongue roll Gira
- space-jazz section...something is coming/cumming...
- I'm American so I have no idea what the fuck he is saying right now
- FREEEEEEEE....DOM Dom dom....
- Beautiful cries of desperation. Can't believe I've been in this 30 minute trance
- HERE....WE....GO!!!! My ears are fucking destroyed!
- That was beyond intense....goddamnit!!!

05 Some Things We Do 5:09
- violin plucking and swells with another "we...." mantra
- really needed this relaxation
- I take that back....this sounds like Hitchcock chillin' on a beach
- Michael is describing the human experience
- "we love...we love...."

06 She Loves Us 17:01
- first 4 minutes sounds like smoking crack at Christmas
- piano drip drone...
- brutal free form noise-pump...rhythm section is killing it right now
- 7 minutes in and a repetitive groove begins to build, kinda funky
- love that lead guitar part (almost sounds like Gary Numan synth or something)
- MOW MOW MWEOWWWW! (Michael has been watching too much Super Troopers)
- HALLELUJAH!
- Michael is screaming "FUCK FUCK FUCK!" as if he were Tim "The Toolman" Taylor and accidently hit his finger with a hammer
- groove collapses and falls apart at the end into choir of discontent
- WHOA! just added another brutal riff near the end for the fuck of it

07 Kirstin Supine 10:33
- another needed break. calm but anxious
- okay this has to be Annie Clark doing the harmony behind a nice bell melody
- full band finally kicks in about halfway through, church bells and all
- repetitive rhythm section building over drone guitars and strings
- no real pay off

08 Oxygen 7:59
- okay I guess this is the climax I was looking for
- similar to the live version as far as I can remember
- the goddamn drum and bass on this song!!!!!
- heaviest track on the album
- BRICK HOUSE!!!!!
- this is what you wanted from Swans

09 Nathalie Neal 10:15
- weird Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom garbly intro
- another of my favs I'd like to add
- jangly piano thing is back
- woman voice over. sounds like it's recorded from a cellphone
- I love the groove of this song
- NATA LEY EH EH EH EH EH EHHHHHHHH
- "Live forever in this song....Natalie!!" Did this chick pay $500 to Gira?
- Probably the catchiest melody
- Desert outro "Na...Na na na na...Nathalie"
- Wow this is over already

10 To Be Kind 8:23
- string and choir intro
- piano melody behind Michael's lyrics
- "There are millions and millions of stars in your eyes!"
- the band begins to swell and crash into a formless drone
- again lashing and lashing and lashing, beating you into the ground
- ends with a formless drone into vicious fucking destruction

....goddamn

[Severian]

Uhh.... I'm listening to this right now.

More later.

[Severian]

Still listening. I'm not really present today. I exist only to hear this album.

[Skuj]

Talk to Skujy.

[Severian]

Man, it's insane. I don't know what to make of it. On one hand it's "classic" Swans - heavy drones that sound like the nicotine fit of an ancient God, interspersed with self-calming, hymnal meditations... all to the jagged snapping bass and thunderous thud of the band in top "vamp" form.

It's not revelatory in the same way the Seer was. But it's definitely an experience. Gira is in a cathartic, chaotic trance for much of the record, and there is a lot of strange lyrical imagery that almost sounds random.... Like a Titan with Tourette's. Gone are the folk and country influences that made the Seer such an epic, but the noise (my god, the noise) and the muscular drone have returned.

More sparsely produced; sounds kind of live.

Brings to mind images of: the sun, sun gods, Egypt, Pyramids, Night sky, dreams, black holes, faeries, fucking, Hinduism, heat, pedophilia

On my second listen now. Maybe more will reveal itself to me this time.

[Skuj]

Fuckin A. Thanks.

[halgreen]

I don't understand why you can't get a DVD with the LP package? Why would it only be included with the CD? They did the same thing with The Seer and its pretty frustrating.

[Screaming Skull]

Swans release "Oxygen" from 'To Be Kind'...

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archive...se_o.html#more

[Skuj]

Fuck me, this is great, in a Las Vegas Goes To Hell kind of way.

[Skuj]

I'm not a vinyl buyer, but it was very interesting how the track order for Seer 3LP differed from CD. Has anyone seen 3LP listing for TBK?

[Skuj]

Those 2 released tracks make me very very happy about TBK. (FUCK, SYG, don't you care about Swans?)

[Skuj]

http://noisey.vice.com/blog/swans-lp...rce=noiseyfbus

[Bytor Peltor]

^^^hey, I was going to post that......good read!

[Skuj]

Sounds very spacey in parts. Quite a different feel than Seer. I'm sensing from the two released songs and this sampler that TBK is more complex than Seer. "Little Boy" vocals in this sampler sound a bit over the top, haha....in a Mick Jagger 2014 kind of way. Hmmm....

[Blood_Promise]

Can't wait for the release of this beautiful monstrosity.

[Skuj]

Seer is my favourite album, hands down. Next 19 days is gonna be hell for me, hahaha. I feel that this band is at the absolute peak of their powers. TBK will be a monster indeed. It's very special when someone turning 60 this year does not suck, is continuing to push boundaries and find new areas to explore. This is fucking wonderful.

[Skuj]

I want to add that I did recently find My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To The Sky 2cd with the 46min extra disc. It has superb moments but I cannot overcome the feeling that it was merely a warmup for what followed.

[Blood_Promise]

I'd like to hear My Father version of Oxygen. I am pretty sure they tried to record it, as the name for the album comes from the original acoustic version of Oxygen. Just guessing...

TBK Oxygen sounds mad, but not as ferocious as the live version from Not Here/Not Now.

About The Seer, it is definitely not my favorite Swans album (that would be Swans are Dead, hence my user name, if live records count), but it has a peculiar quality of sucking my energy and crushing me down. After listening to The Seer I usually feel tired, but in a good way. The Apostate brought me many joyful moments of torturing my flat mates, to the point that one even attacked me and I had to defend with a kitchen knife. That's what Swans do to you.

[h8kurdt]

Having listened to it I'll say this-they've done it again.