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Michael Gira The Body Lovers: Number One of Three
University of Toronto's VarsityAnyone who has spent as long doing music like Michael Gira deserves respect.Unfortunately, there are few artists around who can match Gira’s fifteen-odd-year commitment to a singular vision. As the father and main member of the Swans since the early eighties, he perpetuated an instantly recognizable style throughout perpetual personnel and sonic changes. While the Swans’ fellow New Yorkers and initial touring mates Sonic Youth became lost in a poptastic daydream of commercial acceptance, Gira got down in the underground and created masterworks like The Great Annihilator... Read more...
Number One of Three | The Body Lovers | Review
Williamette Week | John Graham...everything from dense, sludgy dirges to airy, orchestrated hymns with a sense of disturbance…As the unquestioned leader (dictator?) of Swans, Michael Gira imbued everything from dense, sludgy dirges to airy, orchestrated hymns with a sense of disturbance--even the tamest of his works were fraught with melancholy and menace. Now Swans are gone, but this Body Lovers project is an incisive continuation of his past obsessions; in fact, Number One of Three is, for all intents and purposes, Soundtracks for the Blind (Swans' last album) without the... Read more...
Overall impression: good.
Mark WeddleThe Body Haters / The Body Lovers are the first post-SWANS releases from Michael Gira.The Body Haters is a single track, predominantly instrumental accompaniment to last year's superb Body Lovers "Number One of Three". Whereas the Lovers disc was more varied in sound and mood, the Haters disc focuses solely on a shifting drone throughout the 34 minutes and 13 seconds (with the exception of some heavily processed, moaning vocals by Jarboe in the latter part). "34:13" was obviously created by feeding sounds into a Macintosh (as evidenced by... Read more...
The Hammer and the Anvil:
Paul McEnery | Axcess MagazineOnce apon a time, a couple of New York noise bands were up each other's arseholes…...on tour together, recording each other's songs, redefining the state of aural attack. Sonic Youth and Swans are different bands now. Youth went overground (ahem) the year punk broke. Swans drove the hard road into a ditch last year—but breaking up has been a creatice breakthrough. Fifteen years later, Axcess is proud to present this address on the start of the art of noise. Dead Alive: An apparently endless wake wound... Read more...
EX-SWANS FRONTMAN PERFORMS IN N.Y. WITH MEMBERS OF IGGY POP, MINISTRY
Kevin Raub | Rocktopolis / AllstarEx-Swans frontman Michael Gira, whose dark, moody punk soundscapes have proved cathartic to a slew of post-early '80s punk bands, will perform an exclusive American engagement of his latest project, the Body Lovers, in New York in September.The Body Lovers are Gira's first project since Swans' farewell performance in London in 1997. Described as a "psycho- ambient soundtrack- without- a- film," the Body Lovers' debut CD, Number One of Three, was released last April. According to Gira, the transition from extreme, shell- shocking punk to... Read more...
The Body Lovers | Number One of Three | Review
University of Torontounified and emotion-laden musicAnyone who has spent as long doing music like Michael Gira deserves respect. Unfortunately, there are few artists around who can match Gira’s fifteen-odd-year commitment to a singular vision. As the father and main member of the Swans since the early eighties, he perpetuated an instantly recognizable style throughout perpetual personnel and sonic changes. While the Swans’ fellow New Yorkers and initial touring mates Sonic Youth became lost in a poptastic daydream of commercial acceptance, Gira got down in the underground and created masterworks like... Read more...
The Body Lovers | Number One of Three | Review
Ink 19 | Drew Westintended to be played as one long nightmarePowerful. Emotional. Unnerving. These words are almost always used to describe SWANS, but let's not go there. Gira has taken off on the most disturbing soundscapes I've heard to date and the words above apply one hundred percent. It is intended to be played as one long nightmare, but thankfully ten locator points have been dropped in case your spine can't handle it. Best way I can imagine listen to The Body Lovers would be while reading The Consumer... Read more...
The Body Lovers | Number One of Three | Review
University of Torontounified and emotion-laden musicAnyone who has spent as long doing music like Michael Gira deserves respect. Unfortunately, there are few artists around who can match Gira’s fifteen-odd-year commitment to a singular vision. As the father and main member of the Swans since the early eighties, he perpetuated an instantly recognizable style throughout perpetual personnel and sonic changes. While the Swans’ fellow New Yorkers and initial touring mates Sonic Youth became lost in a poptastic daydream of commercial acceptance, Gira got down in the underground and created masterworks like... Read more...
The Body Lovers | Number One of Three | Review
University of Torontounified and emotion-laden musicAnyone who has spent as long doing music like Michael Gira deserves respect. Unfortunately, there are few artists around who can match Gira’s fifteen-odd-year commitment to a singular vision. As the father and main member of the Swans since the early eighties, he perpetuated an instantly recognizable style throughout perpetual personnel and sonic changes. While the Swans’ fellow New Yorkers and initial touring mates Sonic Youth became lost in a poptastic daydream of commercial acceptance, Gira got down in the underground and created masterworks like... Read more...
The Body Lovers | Number One of Three | Review
FM Outlook #49 | Danen JobeNew York Noise Has A Mid Life CrisisSonic Youth—A Thousand Leaves (DGC) The Body Lovers—One of Three (Young God/Atavistic) Sixteen years ago an amazing movement began in New York City. This was a movement which came out of Glenn Branca's infamous guitar orchestras, and was quickly dubbed the New York Noise movement. Most famous of these original groups (which also included Live Skull and 8 Eyed Spy) were Sonic Youth and Swans, who were often found touring together, making people's ears hurt all over the... Read more...

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