Swans – Birthing (Mute) (13th Floor Album Review)
Swans are a saga, Micheal Gira the driving element behind the entity has continued to challenge the very paradigm of what post-punk, industrial dance and to a lesser extent gothic metal as the decades have traversed.
Their first compositions in 1982, were brutal counter-culture strains, and as the Michaeal Gira (and others) flourished, the sound of Swans morphed into aberrations that continue to challenge their followers’ expectations.
The seventeenth album from Swans, Birthing dissipates over 116 minutes, presented as seven songs. The shortest song at 6.51 Red Yellow, is a gentler, conventional, rich, as close to a college radio friendly song as you find on the album. The longest at 22.20 is the album’s title track, Birthing, a complex composition that builds in baroque, it is slow, morose and hypnotic, particularly when Gira’s vocals are in play, the building rhythm at the end though, but is a rich reward.
The advance single – I Am A Tower (at 19.37) builds with guest (female) vocals, the soundtrack is emotionally inviting and transforms when Gira’s throaty voice sermons over it intermittently using recurrent phrasing that grows to a poetic closing. Not all is melancholic, Merge at 15.19 is reminiscent of Swans origins, with its highly rhythmic industrial beat transformed not once, but twice, via a young voice into aural dadaism and then again into gothic melodies topped off by Gira’s vocals. There are more journeys on Birthing, but I leave you to discover those brush strokes, sometimes saying less is more.
But what is noticeable on Birthing are the three pillars: the complexity of sounds offered, these thwart all attempts to categorise Swans. Micheal Gira’s voice, though noticeably toned down, still goes where Leonard Cohen never quite went, and the thematic emotional imperium that prioritises that requites listeners to work for euphoria, rather than simplistically consuming a sugar-coated hit.
Simon Coffey
Order Birthing HERE
Michael Gira has announced solo tour dates for a European tour in April with Kristof Hahn – full details below. Details of Swans tour dates to support Birthing will follow
