PRESS » SWANS
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Live Review: Swans @ Academy 2, Manchester | AltSounds
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It’s with excitement, intrigue and slight nervousness that I approach tonight’s show at Manchester Academy 2. I’ve never seen Swans live before. In fact until now I’ve only listened to their music a handful of times, checking out 2012’s The Seer after it was given deservedly gleaming reviews by pretty much every music website going, and more recently (today) giving their latest To Be Kind a spin just before setting off to the gig. I may not have heard much of their music before tonight but Swans are a band with a fierce reputation for being nihilistic, adversarial, yet beautiful. I’d also heard various rumours that they are so loud that it induces vomiting, fainting and bleeding from various orifices in audience members. How could anyone turn down the opportunity to see for themselves if these rumours are true?!The first thing you notice when walking into the Academy is the huge stack of speakers on either side of the stage. The New Yorkers have brought an extra PA system with them in addition to the venues already formidable set-up. It’s big enough to rival those earth shattering dub soundsystems used by the likes of Iration Steppas. Norwegian artist Jenny Hval prepares the crowd for an evening of challenging and thought provoking music......
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Live Review: Swans, Warehouse 34, Newcastle | The Shields Gazette
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ATTRACTING acclaim and interest like never before, Michael Gira and Swans’ reformation surely ranks among the most spectacular musical successes of recent times. That rejuvenation was on full display before both old heads and new converts on Friday at Warehouse 34, on a night when classic material was generally overlooked in favour of new opuses - particularly from phenomenal new album To Be Kind. Challenging, uncompromising and notoriously loud, the past three decades have seen the New Yorkers’ live shows become a thing of legend, and indeed their sensory assault can leave you feeling like you’ve been smashed head-on by a double-decker bus. It is, however, a controlled battering, harnessed by a group of terrifically proficient and creative musicians who performed their roles spot-on throughout, even amid some of the most chaotic, rip-roaring pieces imaginable. That much was apparent before Gira even entered the fray, as the six-piece - led by hairy, bare-chested percussionist Thor Harris - emerged one-by-one in a devastating, droning build-up which lasted the best part of 10 minutes. This was very much a sign of things to come, with the subsequent two-hour set yielding a grand total of seven songs, each characterised by overwhelming sonic......
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Michael Gira – Arcadia Series at St John’s Church, London | The Line of Best Fit
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Forming part of a series that sees New York’s experimental champion William Basinski pay homage to his infamous Arcadia Studio with specially curated events around London, Michael Gira performed an evening of darkly unrelenting no-wave folk at Hackney’s St John’s Church.Perhaps the father of American post-industrial rock as lead singer of Swans, Gira was a natural choice for the unique collaboration that was spearheaded by organisation Art Assembly. Historically proven to be at the forefront of leftfield music, his growling and direct approach to his solo work was only amplified by heavenly acoustics of the vast well-chosen venue.Ensuring the Arcadia ethos of providing a platform for new artists edging into the experimental scene was faithfully acknowledged, the handpicked line up also featured newcomer Aino Tytti alongside an atmospheric set from Basinski himself. Having embraced a more modernist approach to things, both Tytti and Basinski enlisted the help of laptops to compose swirling ethereal soundscapes that score the stuff of hallucinogenic dreams.As reality melted away to meditation, Tytti’s set featured field recordings from the everyday peppered amongst heaving masses of intricate instrumentation. In comparison from the seemingly freeform composition of Tytti’s work, Basinski showcased more structured material from his impending......
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Michael Gira @ Church of St John, London | Bearded Magazine
() - Michael Gira, SWANS
Michael Gira // William Basinski @ Church of St John, London A mesmeric show from two of NYCs most revered avant garde composers As London begins what might be a fleeting early summertime and a gorgeous sunset descends over the office blocks and vibrant streets of east London, an evening with two of New York’s more respected explorers of space and noise within music may not seem like an ideal soundtrack to the warm breeze and orange skies outside but as we wander into the Church of St John in Hackney any thoughts of sunshine fade as lights dim and the music starts.First to take the small stage is William Basinski. Best known for his Disintegration Loops project which saw the woozy atmospherics of decaying audio provide a sonic backdrop to the tragic events of 9/11 unfolding in front of the video camera on the roof of his Brooklyn Apartment. It was the resulting 74 minutes that saw Basinski’s composition inducted into the 9/11 Memorial Museum as a harrowing document of one the most tragic days of the 21st century. It’s also Basinski who is curating this series of London tributes to Arcadia, the Brooklyn art-space that became the hub for performance art......
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Freq Live Review | M. Gira Solo in France
() - Michael Gira, SWANS
Michael Gira/Ulan Bator (live at les Abattoirs) Bourgoin-Jallieu1 March 2014 Tonight’s show at les Abattoirs provides a chance forMichael Gira to share a stage with Ulan Bator, a band he worked with on the Ego:Echo album in 2000. The venue is an unusual one, sat on the corner of a roundabout on the outskirts of a small town on the road to Grenoble from Lyon. Taking place on one of the busy weekends in the sprawling school holidays (when it seems like the whole of France goes on co-ordinated trips to the Alps with subsequent lengthy tailbacks along the autoroutes into the mountains) means that – alongside the supposed distance from the city centre – that, for a Saturday night, the venue is unfortunately not very busy at all. Undaunted, Ulan Bator take the stage and commence a live soundtrack to Salvador Dalí and Luis Buñuel‘s Un Chien Andalou which matches the surrealism on screen with music which follows a similar symbolic trajectory into the depths of the human psyche. Opening with a hissing intake and exhalation of breath as Buñuel strops his razor under scudding moonlit clouds, the band crash in with full force and vigour as the infamous and still-disturbing eyeball-slicing scene flickers into goo-dripping view. It’s a cinematic tour de force which......