UPCOMING SHOWS

Sep 7 – Sunn O))) and Boris Present ALTAR with BXI and Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple (more info below) buy tickets here

Oct 8 -  SWANS with Baby Dee at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple (more info below) buy tickets here

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**Tuesday September 9 at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple**

ALL TOMORROW’S PARTIES and THE BLACKENED MUSIC SERIES PRESENTS
SUNN O))) and BORIS Present ALTAR
plus very special guests BXI and Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter

The first NYC performance of ALTAR.  The first US performance of BXI (Boris with Ian Astbury).
Tickets on sale now

**Friday October 8 at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple **

THE BLACKENED MUSIC SERIES, HAUNTING THE CHAPEL and ISSUE PROJECT ROOM PRESENTS

SWANS

with Baby Dee

Tickets on sale now

Michael Gira’s re-activated Swans will be undertaking their first U.S. performances in 13 years, celebrating the Fall release of the first new Swans album since Soundtracks For The Blind (1997).

Michael Gira founded the seminal NYC band Swans in 1982. Quickly infamous for their punishing, brutal and repetitive onslaughts of sound, extreme volume levels, and the self-abusing, abject shouts and growlsof Gira’s sloganeering vocals, Swans gradually transformed over 15 years, ultimately venturing into harsh mechanical proto-industrial rock, to sprawling shifts of texture and perspective (see the bucolic atmospheric folk idles and martial stomps of their much heralded Children of God double LP from 1987), to gentle acoustic-based songs, and finally on to their ultimate statement, Soundtracks For The Blind (1997) which somehow incorporated all of these elements at once, across well over 2 hours of music in one album. At this point, Gira called it quits after 15 years of relentless touring and productivity, and disbanded Swans.

Recently, Gira decided to re-activate Swans. Here’s what he has to say about that decision at the YGR website:

“About reconstituting Swans: There was a point a few years ago during a particular show when I was on tour with Angels  Of Light, with Akron/Family serving as the backing band. It was during the song “The Provider.” Seth’s guitar was sustaining one open chord (very loudly), rising to a peak, then crashing down again in a rhythm that could have been the equivalent of a deep and soulful act of copulation. The whole band swayed with this arc. Really was like riding waves of sound.  I thought right then, “You know, Michael, Swans wasn’t so bad after all…” . Ha ha!

It brought back – in a flood – memories, or maybe not memories, more a tangible re-immersion in the sensation of Swans music rushing through my body in waves, lifting me up towards what, I can only assume, will be my only experience of heaven. It’s difficult – and probably pointless – to try to describe this experience. It’s ecstatic, I suppose – a force of simultaneous self negation and rebirth. Really, I probably only experienced this a handful of times to such an extreme extent during the entire 15 year history of Swans. All the elements have to align perfectly, and you can’t force it, though you might constantly strive for it. I don’t mean to be too lofty here, but it’s a fact. I’m talking about my own experience of the music (though I’d hope people in the audiences along the way might have experienced a similar episode). When I ask myself if I believe in God, I start to say NO, but then I remember that sensation, and I’m not so sure. So I want more of that, before my body breaks down to such an extent that it won’t be possible any more. So I’m doing it.

Naturally, some of the material for this new record will be songs, centered around the voice and words. Other parts (I’m hoping) will be reaching for what I’ve described above. One thing I want to point out right now: THIS IS NOT A REUNION. It’s not some dumb-ass nostalgia act. It is not repeating the past. After 5 Angels Of Light albums, I needed a way to move FORWARD, in a new direction, and it just so happens that revivifying the idea of Swans is allowing me to do that. I’ll be using what I learned in the last several years to inform the way this new material develops, while carrying forward from where Swans left off with its final album Soundtracks For The Blind, and in particular, Swans Are Dead. If you have expectations about how Swans should be, that’s your business, but it would be a disservice to both of us if I were to make music with your needs in mind, and the music would certainly suffer as a result. In any event, I certainly never thought this day would arrive, but it’s inevitable, it’s here, it’s fate, so I’m succumbing to it.

Helping me in this quest are the fantastic musicians and friends listed below. I’ll enter the studio with the songs, we’ll hash them out together, someone will come up with something unexpected, then that will lead to new ideas, the song will take a different trajectory and the material will grow on its’ own. This is what I’m hoping, anyway.

Here’s the main musicians (though probably a lot of guests on the recording). These are the people best suited – in terms of my relationship with them and their particular musical attributes – to help move the music forward:  Michael Gira – guitar/voice/mendicant friar act (original Swans); Norman Westberg – guitar (original Swans); Christoph Hahn – guitar (mid-period Swans); Phil Puleo – drums, percussion, dulcimer etc (final Swans tour); Chris Pravdica – bass and gadgets; Thor Harris -  drums, percussion, vibes, dulcimer, curios, keys,  etc … at the time of this writing the album is still in progress. Additional guests so far include Devendra Banhart; Bill Rieflin (drummer for R.E.M.) and Grasshopper of Mercury Rev… “