Swans: Classic or Dud?

When I saw Angels of Light play Tonic, he drank a full pint of whiskey in a glass filled from behind the bar and didn't seem in the least bit drunk. After the show, he went and got a refill and mingled like he was at an art opening or something.

His writing is pretty disturbing.

Jarboe seems to have severe mental problems. Oh yeah, and so does Gira.

-- Ficky Stingers (bimble87...), Sunday 1:33 AM. (Bimble...) (later) (link)

best/scariest/best thing ever.
Weird that two completely different Swans C or D threads just got revived a few days apart. Here's the other:
Classic or Dud: Swans

OK...Happy Ned...Did this already...but isn't exactly what I was looking for anyway...

Screw this....

I'm gonna give up on the Swans...

Filth is one of my all-time favorite albums. I'd recommend that one, but it may not be the best convince-me-otherwise album.

Its Aja!

Yeah, hi....

I find it funny that my thread was locked so soon...

Anyway, I was bored and wanted to see what was up in these parts...I really should be getting to sleep though...

I think it's funny that you say "screw this" because Swans have a song called A Screw don't they? Heheh.

Also there is some really fantastic Swans stuff on You Tube. But in all honesty, Swans are not a band I would likely try to argue with someone into liking the way I would, say, Led Zeppelin or even the Fall. I find it perfectly understandable that some folks will never get Swans.

I think it's funny that you say "screw this" because Swans have a song called A Screw don't they? Heheh.

-- Bimble, Monday, May 28, 2007 7:04 AM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

They do? Gosh...is it any good? Or is it really slow and weird...

Well there are two different versions I found.

This one is a more beefed up version of the album version with horns and a heavy industrial beat:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqiEmNaG5QY

This one is a live performance, and more bare-bones, truer to their early material and I prefer it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHES9YAGGkU

Of course this is before they became a lot more listenable, pretty and mellow.

Ok................

Interesting. I'll leave it at that.

I got into the first couple of albums for a while, saw them live, then gradually decided that life was just too short for Gira's schtick. Haven't listened to them for ten years.

I have a promo copy of 'Cop' which was issued to Radio Forth, our local top forty station, a thought that makes me laugh every time I flick past it on the stack.

Aja, you can say you hate it, I don't care! It's ugly music. Soukesian, I think that's part of their appeal that they make you laugh in the end.

Here's something called "Love of Life" from later on when they'd mellowed out more:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=girFIccfmBU

Fuckin goths

I took about a 15 year break from them, but lately have been filling in what happened after 1990, and I'm impressed at how consistent they've been, and it's all hitting me with a renewed force. Yeah, they're as funny ha-ha as they are funny strange, but I find that I can't doubt what Gira was reaching for. And when they hit, wow, beat and message and emotion come together equally. And the beauty really does start poking through the ugliness.

Having said that I'm planning to buy some of their shit pretty soon. BUT. They are goths.

Goths perhaps, but of a different stripe. I don't think black clothes are really necessary with them or their fans.

Gosh...is it any good? Or is it really slow and weird...]

or? OR? OR?!?!

have been filling in what happened after 1990

Some of their best and most rewarding work, IMO. I wish somebody would reissue "Die Tur Ist Zu" because I still haven't heard it. Also check out those Gira and Jarboe solo records that Alternative Tentacles did.

part of their appeal that they make you laugh in the end

Yeah, I don't see this happening at all.

I believe this was the second ever thread I contributed to, back in the day (when the earth was young and the seas were hot and the skies were filled with pteradactyles).

SWANS were untouchably brilliant and will always remain so. But GOTHS they are not. Not in the slightest. And I know two ex-Swans who would happily bludgeon anyone who dared refer to them as such.

i always thought swans were funny. and they are one of my favorite bands. in my top four anyway. when i first got internet in 1999 i joined a swans list and i confessed that i always thought that the song failure was really funny. i expected to get yelled at. but nobody yelled. and jarboe agreed that lots of swans had very dry humor too it, but that a lot of people didn't see it. or didn't want to see it. and if you ever went to a swans show you would see these deadly serious fans. they were the ones who loked like the memebers of controlled bleeding. they weren't in it for the funny.

Were Live Skull goths?

x-post

LOTS of goths love swans though. that's why the two get connected. and goths LOVE world of skin and angels of light and jarboe too.

no, live skull were not goths.

or didn't want to see it.

or actually didn't think it was funny maybe - you have to allow for that.

and they were a HUGE influence on goth bands. just as they were on metal bands and all kinds of bands. i like to call swans "traditional folk music".

yeah, i mean, you might think that public castration is a good idea is a funny album title or you might just think that public castration is a good idea. too each his own.

Swans from Circus Mort to Cop is absolutely classic. It's sad the CD versions of Filth and the eponymous EP were remastered so badly, but they're still worth getting.

could you elaborate a bit? Not that I plan on replacing my vinyl, but I'm curious as to what went wrong. Is this also true of the Cop and Children Of God remasters?

Scott's right, it's because lots of goths like Swans that they get tagged that way.

The remasters are cleaned up with reverb added and EQ bent toward the ends. If you've heard original Teenage Jesus or Mars vinyl and compared it to the CDs of the same, it's a similar effect, although not quite as reverb-chamber-in-hell as it is on the TJ remasters.

I don't know whether the Cop remaster has a similar issue, since I don't have it, and I'm not sure whether I have a remastered or original Children of God.

Thanks. That TJ&TJ remaster gets my vote for "worst job ever", so I'll steer clear of the Filth CD.

which version of filth is supposed to have this problem? the single cd jewelcase one from a long time ago or the somewhat more recent 2cd reissue?

Here's 25 seconds of a track from the Filth/body to body, job to job double CD:

http://rapidshare.com/files/33942016/filth_reissue_-_06_-_Right_Wrong__25_second_clip_.mp3.html

hope this helps?

Live Skull were VERY decidedly NOT goths. Hurrumph!

I have the Zensor vinyl version of 'Filth' - always thought it was meant to sound, well, filthy. What would/does cleaning it up reveal - the melodies?

Alex, they had a heavy goth streak

just because it's really really good doesn't mean it's not goth man

which version of filth is supposed to have this problem?

My CD from around 1990 is poorly-mastered. I dunno about any later versions.

Would it really be SO bad if your favorite band turned around and said "Yeah, actually, we were always Goths. At the end of the night, it was always all about getting with those Siouxsie clones. So kill us. The records are still OK though? Aren't they? Aren't they?"

Alex, they had a heavy goth streak

Live Skull? No they fucking didn't.

Look, I LOVE a lot of unapologetically Goth bands -- from Alien Sex Fiend through Theatre of Hate through the Mission through Fields of the Nephilim -- but the fact remains that Live Skull and SWANS simply WERE NOT members of that flock.

Well, at the time, goths sure as hell wanted nothing to do with Swans. This is true. It'd be more apt to call the Misfits goth, 'cause they were loved by every goth in (my) town.

ANYWAY.

i confessed that i always thought that the song failure was really funny.

One of my favorite Swans moments ever -- I'm DJing at KUCI during my grad school years and someone calls me up during finals week or just thereafter. Turns out it's another grad on campus, like me a TA. He goes, "I've been looking at all these student papers and I have a request -- can you play the Swans' "Failure" for them?" And so I did, and I would have also bought him a drink if I could.

As soon as Jarboe joined Swans (the Time Is Money 12") it became fair to call them goth. If you saw them during the Jarboe period you know that was a proper goth throwdown.

Snuffer counts as goth. However, the only evidence I can offer for this proposition is "it sure seemed goth to me at the time, and that is in fact why I bought it."

I chatted him up after a show in Houston and asked if he ever wore earplugs. He gave me quite a dour look.

If he was my neighbor I would refer to him as “Chuckles.”

I chatted him up after a show in Houston and asked if he ever wore earplugs. He gave me quite a dour look.

If he was my neighbor I would refer to him as “Chuckles.”

lmao that Ben Frost didn’t allow himself to be caricatured, dude appears to be somewhat self obsessed

Why Can't I Have What I Want Any Time That I Want? (7:38)

uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

yeah i dunno i'll probably check this out though xD

The Beggar Lover (Three) (43:51)

beats Richard Dawson by almost three full minutes!

I hadn’t realized it was out. Enjoying it.

It's pretty good

Haven't found much discussion of the remastering, I listened to White Light last night, it sounds great but very different, just now reading that aside from the obvious change (adding "Blind") that some of these songs are significantly different edits, I'm a bit dismayed but at least I still have my old Various Failures and White Light CDs. Maybe someday there'll be deluxe versions with all versions. I don't have a lot of experience listening to remasters of old favourites, hope it won't always cause this anxiety.

I didn't know about the edits.

I only have the remastered White Light from the Mouth of Infinity. I just have all the old CDs from the 90s that were bunched together

The live band from 1988 was one of the best things I'd ever heard, extremely heavy folk rock. Played by most of the band that recorded Children Of God but with a different drummer. It took me an age to get hold of recordings from that era. I missed getting the official botleg which I think documents it Anonymous Bodies in an Empty Room . Not sure if that has been reissued. I think the sound they reached at the time does inform their more recent incarnation to some extent.

Remaster still sounds great, but different things are brought forward, I can't quite say what it is I'm missing from the older version

How do they compare to the original LPs?

Just dropping in her to say that I listened to Screen Shot and Oxygen again today annd they are two of the best songs ever produced (and I don’t really care for this band much). Carry on!

I've never heard the vinyl versions of any of them

me neither