I feel like I've been working on this for fucking ages on and off and since they're officially reuniting, I'm just going to post what I do have done and hope it motivates me to finish the rest soon.
Swans
Filth (1983)
Swans debut is as harsh and unforgiving as anything you're likely to hear. It's like Michael Gira and company invoked all the negative feelings in all of New York City in the early 80's and distilled it into one brutal, ugly blast of grinding No Wave. As to be expected from a debut album, it shows Swans at their most primitive. There's not much in terms of musical ability, with most of the songs being comprised of repetitive plodding industrial dirges over which Gira chants and moans about power, control, self-loathing, etc. While there's not much variety here, it's still a lot less monochromatic than the releases immediately following this with a few slight touches of distortion effects (the vocals on opener "Stay Home," the strange, noisy interlude "Freak," the semi-coherent "Gang"). It's not very much fun, but it's a small masterpiece of angst and aggression. The band occasionally gets locked into something of hypnotic death grind groove that's very effective if you're in the mood for it. It's usually where I go if I'm in the mood for pre-Jarboe Swans. Tacked on to the end is the first EP recorded by the band under a previous incarnation, which sounds significantly different from Filth. These four songs have more in common with bands like the Birthday Party, and are considerably more upbeat from any other early Swans material. Worth hearing.
B
Cop/Young God (1984-ish, reissued together 1993)
As bleak as Filth was, Swans found some way to make their follow up, Cop (re-released with a different running order and an EP from the same era mixed in), even more punishing. Their sound is even more stripped (and slowed) down, with Gira's more forceful vocals being brought further out in the mix. The lyrics are more of the same: lust, power, abuse, hatred. The title track pretty well sums up the mood here; Gira rambles about how "nobody rapes you like a cop" over a bass heavy dirge that makes the Melvins sound like Tiny Tim. Most of the tracks sound pretty similar, with barely even the lyrics to distinguish them. It's all played out like metal slowed down to the pace of a slug's crawl. It's pretty hard to digest, especially in one sitting, but you have to admire them for acheiving what they set out to accomplish here. Most music that tries to sound as unsettling as this tends to come off as cartoonish and over the top, but this album feels very straight faced and dedicated to its atmosphere of misery. I'm very rarely in the mood for this and most people don't have a need for music this grim and unrelenting, so I can't really recommend it, but it deserves credit for being a unique accomplishment in ugliness.
B-
Greed/Holy Money (1986-ish, reissued together 1993)
This release is a combination of Swans' third and fourth albums, which work well together as a piece. While still as wretched as ever, on these albums the band lightens up just a shade. There are a few tracks that could have been on Cop, but there's just as many that sees them reaching forward to a new sense of musicality. One of the biggest changes is in the introduction of Gira's unsettling cool and calm croon that would become a distinctive trademark of the band over the next decade. Another important element added to the band around this time is female vocalist Jarboe, who served as a more gentle, although no less haunting, contrast to Gira's blunt force. There's also more diverse instrumentation than the typical guitar squeals, bass rumbles, and clanging percussion, including horns and pianos. The Jarboe sung piano ballad "Blackmail" is about the last thing you would expect to hear on a Swans album at this point, but it doesn't feel at odds with the rest of the material here. "Money is Flesh" and "A Screw" feature stabbing horn blasts that go a long way in relieving the monotony and despair of the proceedings. It's not an outright revolution of their sound, merely an opening up and expansion, but it paves the way for their future masterpieces of sinister beauty.
B
Children Of God (1987)
Here's where Swans come into their own, breaking out of their No Wave inspired niche and producing one of the best albums of the 80's along the way. This is a straight up masterpiece of Gothic grandeur. There's not a weak track on here, and, unlike previous releases, there's a significant amount of diversity between the songs while still cohering into a consistent vision. These songs were meant to be heard together, in a certian order, which is what seperates a good collection of songs from a great album.
Opening with the pounding, organ-tinged call and response chant of "New Mind" before proceeding directly into the melancholy ballad "In My Garden," the album charts a course through a menacing, tragic, gorgeous, and haunting meditation on the effects of love and religion.
Gira has always been obsessed with power and control, so it was only a matter of time before he explored their effect on theology and romance. Despite the grim fury of much of the music, the majority of the lyrics are ambiguously neutral about their subjects, preferring to paint subtle portraits of situations and feelings and letting the listener draw their own conclusions. A good exmple of this is the stunning, strangely beautiful closer, "Children Of God." On its own, it could be taken as a straight faced hymn about the glorious redemption of God's love, but in the context of the rest of the album, it takes on an unsettling undercurren.
The sonic approach this time around is far less abrasive, with folk elements coalescing with the harsher aspects of their sound. There are still remnants of earlier Swans ("New Mind," "Sex, God, Sex") but even these are tempered by a stronger sense of melodicism and a majestic grandiosity that suits the religious themes well. Adding to the improvement in songwriting ability is a perfectly pitched, highly affecting atmosphere of solemn awe. Jarboe's increased presence helps achieve this in no small way. On tracks like "In My Garden" and the remake of their earlier "Blackmail," she exhibits a frail tenderness that finds beauty in pain. Gira, on the other hand, sings in a seductive, low growl that's simultaneously soothing and ominous. A perfect example of his duplicitous nature is in the softly sinister "You're Not Real, Girl", where he casually informs his lover that "nothing inside you is real," especially "when you take my trust in your body." In the context of this gentler approach, the songs that do let the hell fire simmering just below the surface break loose are stronger and more powerful for it, particularly the howling damnation of "Beautiful Child," and the distorted horn laden nightmare "Like A Drug (Sha La La La)."
This album is as good a place as any to start with Swans. From here they would mellow further, introducing an even wider range of influences, but this is the apex of their 80's output. Recommended for anyone interested in the darker depths of alternative rock.
A+
Feel Good Now (1988)
This is a live official bootleg from the Children Of God tour. It features primarily material from that album. The sound quality is pretty poor. There might be some great performances on here, but the sound is so muddied it's not really worth it for anyone but the most dedicated fans.
D
The Burning World/Forever Burned (1989/2003)
The Burning World is the only major label Swans album, and as that usually implies, it's probably their weakest. (Forever Burned is a compiliation that features the entirety of The Burning World with some other songs from the era added to the end). Gira has spoken about his disatisfaction with the album and attributes it to the incompatibility of their sound with the production by Bill Laswell, although the songwriting isn't at its strongest either. It's very much a transitional album. That being said, it's certainly no travesty, and has some very fine moments that point towards future greatness. It's a testament to Swans' power that their weakest album is this strong, really. This is the band at their gentlest, with a strong emphasis on the dark folk elements of their sound. Maybe a result of Laswell's influence, there's also quite a bit of world music elements being introduced here (check the drum patterns on "Mona Lisa, Mother Earth"). Some times the lighter touch makes certain songs pretty unmemorable and tame sounding, such as opener "River That Runs With Love Won't Dry" and "Saved," although they're pleasant enough to listen to while they're on. They just lack the power and dynamicism of prime Swans.
C
White Light From The Mouth Of Infinity (1991)
Here Swans make yet another transition, beginning probably their most diverse, rewarding period. This incarnation of the band is far more accessible than ever before, but instead of feeling watered down, it comes off as a refinement of their sound, favoring lush, layered arrangements over brutal aggression. Starting with the cooing of a baby, opening track "Better Than You" sets the mood for the album, alternating between dramatic, roaring grandiosity and more restrained acoustic passages before finally drifting out on a majestic wave of ethereal chants of the title courtesey of Jarboe, ringing guitar strums, and bells. The rest of the album continues in this vein, contrasting quiet, introspective moments with cinematic soaring blasts of sound pouring out like the white light of the album's title. The albums finds the beauty in themes such as failure, lies, betrayal, and existential uncertainty and, as always, the darkness behind power and love. Despite some very powerful moments, there's an inconsistency here that prevents the album from quite achieving greatness. Certain songs hit exactly all the right notes ("Love Will Save You," "Failure," "Miracle Of Love") while others ("We Will Survive," "Song For The Sun") don't quite meet the promise of their ambitions. There's also a feeling of the band trying the same tricks too many times so that some of the songs feel somewhat indistinguishable from one another. But even these near missteps have enough interesting ideas to recommend them, and overall this marks a large step forward in the development of the band's sound.
B+
Love Of Life (1992)
Love Of Life continues to explore the sound laid down on White Light From The Mouth Of Infinity, although not quite as memorably as that album. In fact, it almost sounds as if it could be a collection of outtakes and spare tracks from that album than a cohesive self contained album. Out of seventeen tracks, six are short instrumental interludes, although they don't really improve the flow of the album as a whole. The main problem is there's too many songs that are content to plod along moodily without really going anywhere. Additionally, they begin to incorporate the sound found aesthetic which they would perfect on
Soundtracks For The Blind, but doesn't quite gel here. A perfect example of this is on "Her," a track that alternately lilts and rages before being overtaken by a sample of some dippy hippie chick that gets more annoying on every listen. When the band does find focus here, though, the songs are up to their usual standard, especially on the leading title track and "Amnesia." Overall, though, this album ranks with
The Burning World as their least essential work. Devoted fans will want to hear this eventually, but newcomers should start elsewhere.
C
The Great Annihilator (1995)
After several albums exploring their more subdued side, Swans return with their second masterpiece, incorporating the moody folk-tinged atmospherics of their previous few releases with a ferocity not heard since
Children Of God. After a howling instrumental intro, the album announces itself with the raging "I Am The Sun," pairing some of Gira's most haunting lyrics delivered with a disaffected deadpan demeanor with children's chants and pummeling percussion. From there, the band vigorously tears through what is probably their strongest set of songs, each with its own distinct atmosphere and cohering into a whole that is substantially more than the sum of its individual parts. Most of the tracks are buried in a wall of sound, similar to much of shoegaze, although there is more forward drive and less narcotized drifting than any shoegaze record. Most tracks strike a balance between a mournful haze and raging ferociousness, drawing from both the rhythmic harshness of their early work and the lilting gothic beauty of their early 90s material. About the only problem with this album is that it's a little too heavily front loaded. The first half is absolutely perfect, containing some of the best songs of their career: the aforementioned "I Am The Sun," the predatory "She Lives!,"
the shimmering meloncholy of "Blood Promise," and the soaring "Mind/Body/Light/Sound." The second half is a somewhat more subdued affair, although it still contains it's fair share of impressive moments, and none of the tracks could be considered weak. Due to this slight unevenness, I'd say this album ranks just behind
Children Of God, but it's a masterpiece in its own right and a great introduction to the world of Swans.
A
To be continued . . .