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All Music Glowing Man Review
Swans - The Glowing Manby Paul Simpson http://www.allmusic.com/album/the-glowing-man-mw0002937549 Following the unprecedented critical and commercial success of Swans' double-album masterworksThe Seer and To Be Kind -- the latter of which reached the Top 40 of both the U.S. and U.K. album charts -- Michael Gira announced that the existing iteration of the band would only produce one more album and tour. The Glowing Man, as with its predecessors, is a sprawling two-hour epic containing lengthy compositions that the band developed during their momentous tours (and documented their progress on limited double-CDs... Read more...
Vanity Fair M. Gira Interview
Swans’ Michael Gira On Dissolving His Band’s Current Lineup The architect of the notoriously loud band’s sound discusses its current cast’s final record out this week. BY SPIKE CARTERhttp://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2016/06/swans-michael-gira-on-dissolving-his-bands-current-lineup In 2009, Michael Gira decided to breathe new life into his band Swans. Originally critic-dubbed “art-rock” contemporaries of Sonic Youth in the early 80s, the band underwent several aesthetic cycles with a rotating cast of characters, all while remaining ranked as one of music’s loudest entities. In 2010, after a 13-year hiatus, a newly consistent lineup of musicians has yielded some of... Read more...
Drowned In Sound Glowing Man Review
Swans - The Glowing Manby Benjamin Bland http://drownedinsound.com/releases/19480/reviews/4150146 The Glowing Man is set to be the end of an(other) era of Swans, an era in which Michael Gira and company have firmly reasserted their position as one of (if not the) most important bands in existence. It was announced last year that this, the band’s fourth album since reactivation in 2010, would be the last with this line-up. Anyone who has seen Swans over the last six years will be acutely aware that this has not been a 'reunion' in... Read more...
Sydney Morning Herald Glowing Man Review
SwansTHE GLOWING MAN (Mute/Create Control)★★★★ The Glowing Man is, according to Michael Gira, a record in which the Swans leader – 62 years old, 14 LPs in – stares into the face of mortality, infinity, God. It sounds like it, too; such lofty thematic ambition matched across a two-hour triple-album striving for the firmament, the transcendent. Its road-tested, drone-laced, doom-etched jams are foreboding, colossal. The opening suite, Cloud Of Forgetting/Cloud Of Unknowing is 38 minutes of thunderous drums, storm and stress; the title-track a 28-minute opus of agitato guitars and... Read more...
Spectrum Culture Glowing Man Review
Swans: The Glowing ManIt is safe to say that this is the best, most ambitious formation of the band ever assembled.by Jake Cole http://spectrumculture.com/2016/06/16/swans-glowing-man/ As the current iteration of Swans, Michael Gira’s mighty, terrifying unit of unclassifiable noise, reaches its conclusion, it is safe to say that it is the best, most ambitious formation of the band ever assembled. Originally an outlet for its frontman’s youthful rage and punctuated by deliberately repulsive lyrics that luxuriated in toxic nihilism, the Swans that is releasing The Glowing Man represents something more reflective... Read more...
Howl and Echoes Glowing Man Review
Swans’ “The Glowing Man” May Be Their Best AlbumAlex Crellinhttp://howlandechoes.com/2016/06/swans-the-glowing-man-is-probably-their-best-album/Swans may just be one of the greatest bands of our time. They consistently deliver phenomenally weird and creative sounds, telling a story with music like none other. With an opening line like that, you might already know my opinion on their new album, The Glowing Man; it’s brilliant. If you came into this review looking for a short summary as to whether you should buy this album, here it is: Yes, absolutely. It’s a two-and-a-half hour epic, and may be Swans’... Read more...
Tiny Mix Tapes Glowing Man Review
SwansThe Glowing Manby SIMON CHANDLERhttp://www.tinymixtapes.com/music-review/swans-glowing-man Tiny Mix Tapes was thrown into something of a behind-the-scenes tizzy last month when it emerged that Beyoncé, that unimpeachable icon of feminine empowerment and liberation, was reportedly making more than a few bucks out of female sweatshop labor in Sri Lanka. Given that we’d joined the rest of the Free World in praising her latest album to the hilt, this news caused something of a stir in our “office,” re-confronting us with the age-old question of whether we can or should divorce ourselves from... Read more...
Consequence Of Sound Glowing Man Review
Swans - The Glowing ManThis incarnation of Michael Gira's band attempts to come to some sort of peaceBY SEAN BARRYhttp://consequenceofsound.net/2016/06/album-review-swans-the-glowing-man/Swans take their time. Their music reflects a unique patience and resilience that sets them apart from other experimental groups. Their history, too, is just as vast, spanning 34 years, 14 albums, and several stylistic and lineup shifts to account for it. Frontman Michael Girahas remained the constant guide throughout it all. The band’s current incarnation (comprising Gira, Christoph Hahn, Thor Harris, Christopher Pravdica, Phil Puleo, and Norman Westberg) arrived on... Read more...
AV Club Glowing Man Review
With The Glowing Man, Michael Gira caps off Swans’ golden age of explorationBy Kevin Warwickhttp://www.avclub.com/review/glowing-man-michael-gira-caps-swans-golden-age-exp-238074 On stage the normally stoic, meditative Michael Gira performs as a sort of mad conductor, gyrating and flailing with what’s to be perceived as the primal, cathartic release of Swans’ music. Omniscient crescendos pile one atop the other as Gira’s possessed body movements often work independently of a track’s overall thrum. The whole production borders on performance art, and has only been honed by the collective’s recent trio of records. Beginning with 2012’s statement The... Read more...
Metro 4* Review
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