>Listen to To Be Kind in 2014
>Never heard of Swans before
>Kinda iffy on my first listen of it
>Start to enjoy it more and more with each subsequent listen
>End up really really liking it
>Decide to listen to The Seer because /mu/ recommended it
Holy shit. The Seer blows TBK out of the fucking water, and it's not even close. Why does /mu/ always talk as if TBK is the superior album when that's so obviously wrong?
>>61439163
Have fun bud!
>>61439163
>Why does /mu/ always talk as if TBK is the superior album when that's so obviously wrong?
I don't know why, TBK was a let down. The Seer was the last real Swans album.
>>61439163
I like The Seer a lot more too. The title track is a lot better than the 24 min song on TBK.
Also the last two songs of The Seer are god tier
>>61439163
to be kind and the seer are like day and night to me
>>61439190
this is helpful; i rec this to you OP
>>61439163
>Listen to The Seer in 2012
>Never heard of Swans before
>Kinda iffy on my first listen of it
>Start to enjoy it more and more with each subsequent listen
>End up really really liking it
>Decide to listen to Soundracks For The Blind because /mu/ recommended it
Holy shit. SftB blows The Seer out of the fucking water, and it's not even close. Why does /mu/ always talk as if Seer is the superior album when that's so obviously wrong?
>>61439163
the seer is easily the best swans album. their earlier stuff is awesome just for the sheer brutality of it and their middle era is at least interesting in terms of experimentation, but musically, the seer is their masterpiece.
TBK is a more focused and visceral version of the Seer. I love both albums though.
>>61439256
this is wrong. sftb is way too scattered. it sounds like a rarities and b-sides comp. there are some great songs but it's not cohesive at all. the seer on the other hand is cohesive musically, stylistically, and thematically
The Seer is the most popular Swans album among new listeners, but it's just not their best.
>>61439355
fite me
>>61439355
>just not their best
then what is
The Seer scared me when i first listened to it.
YOUR CHILDHOOD IS OVER
Public Castration is the best Swans album without a doubt. Soundtracks is a close second because of its experimentation and holy lord The Sound and Helpless Child are amazing but PCIAGI is pretty much the most visceral album of all time.
>>61439476
soundtrack for the blind
Soundtracks is the best. The Seer > TBK. I don't really compare it to old, brutal Swans because they're almost different bands. I prefer the stuff from Cop/Holy Money/Greed/COG over the recent two albums.
>>61439296
If you don't get the cohesiveness of SftB, you're obviously not paying enough attention to the album
>>61440957
please explain how random tape loops, samples of sex slaves, backwards electronic tracks, and droney country songs are cohesive
>>61441113
The album is exactly what the title says it is: A soundtrack. But it's not a soundtrack for a movie or a show, it's a soundtrack for our world, and more specifically, all the evil, darkness, corruption, and injustice in the world. It's a soundtrack for the people who are blind to the darkness in the world.
The album portrays this entire diverse world of rottenness and filth (no pun intended) through not only a variety of musical styles, but a variety of subject matter too. Just look at the lyrics of the songs. "Volcano" is about a girl in Hollywood being taken advantage of by higher-ups who force her into the sex under the guise of giving her success. "All Lined Up" is heavily implied to be written from the perspective of a genocidal dictator sending countless families to their death. The album is supposed to sound very musically and stylistically diverse; it's exploring one major theme through a variety of different scopes
How about this, /mu/: What's the worst Swans album?
The Seer's title track is so fucking boring and it goes absolutely nowhere. It should've only been 10 minutes long at the very most. The Seer Returns is much better to be honest.
>>61442016
Burning World
>>61441585
Well put desu
>>61441585
ok, so there may be a unifying theme, but literally every swans album is about the evil and injustices of the world. musically it's still a mess. sure it's supposed to sound musically diverse, but that doesn't work when some songs are beautiful while others just sound like pointless experimentation for experimentation's sake.
you can keep listening to obscure tape loops but when it comes down to it, i'd say that the actual classical musical composition throughout the entirety of the seer holds more objective merit than random sounds thrown together on the majority of stftb
>>61439561
dude me too. hearing lunacy for the first time and getting to the part where it "really" starts gave me chills.
>>61442629
>the part where it "really" starts
that's one of my favorite moments in music like ever
>>61439163
I've only heard White Light and Great Annihilator and liked them both.
Should I listen to the Seer next? I've been putting it off because it's long AF.
>>61442877
>I've only heard White Light and Great Annihilator
interesting place to start desu but yeah you should definitely listen to the seer if you have some time to do so
>>61439256
>Listen to Soundracks For The Blind in 1996
>Never heard of Swans before
>Kinda iffy on my first listen of it
>Start to enjoy it more and more with each subsequent listen
>End up really really liking it
>Decide to listen to Filth because /mu/ recommended it
Holy shit. Filth blows Soundracks For The Blind out of the fucking water, and it's not even close. Why does /mu/ always talk as if sotb is the superior album when that's so obviously wrong?
>>61439476
Public Castration is a Good Idea. It's the most powerful album by far, and truly showcases what Gira meant and means by "existing in the sound".
It's unbelievably dark and unrelenting. It has clear musical progression. It has a solid, aggressive voice that freely expresses exactly what it wants. It has so much driving, forceful sound behind the voice that you're simply compelled to hear what it has to say. There are so few flaws to the sound we hear in that album, it's just astounding.
>>61442957
Filth gets really old really fast, whereas Soundtracks (or any excerpt of it) can be listened to pretty much whenever or however often you want. There's only a certain number of times you can hear "flex your muscles" before it stops being serious.
>>61442877
If those are your first two Swans albums, I would suggest Love of Life or Children of God before you listen to The Seer. The way Swans as a sound progressed makes it very difficult for people who have listened to the albums you've listened to as starters to transition into the newer, more "drone" and "atmospheric" sound.
The Seer is the best album of all time and i'll fight anyone that says otherwise
>>61443173
I'll fight you. Public Castration is the best Swans album, and the best Swans album is not the best album of all time.
>>61440957
It actually is a composition to be fair to anon.
>>61443155
michael gira is tall af
To Be Kind > The Seer
Filth > Cop
when will people learn
>>61439163
normies! MODS MODS!!!!!!!!!
>>61439256
>>61440722
The Great Annihilator is better than SFTB.
>>61439190
What does C:O mean?
To Be Kind blows the seer out of the water imo. It's just a much better album.
>>61445403
way to think about this critically
>>61442376
this desu
>>61442376
Not that guy, but I guess we have very different opinions on what makes a body of work interesting. I love albums that are just sprawling with little bite sized pieces of music or sonic experimentation as long as they all manage to sound unified and the transitions/pacing are thoughtful. STFTB really appealed to me in that sense. Equal parts songwriting, equal parts total hypnotic expression of sound.
>>61444702
Gira and Jarboe wrote much better lyrics for TGA than Soundtracks, that's what does it for me.
By comparison, Soundtracks sounds like leftovers filled in with more "experimentalism".
SFtB, LoL, PCiaGI, The Seer
The best off all era's of swans. The order is my opinion though. SFtB is it's own era of Swans entirely imo
>>61439256
>mfw Volcano
>>61442957
>Listen to Filth in 1983
>Never heard of Swans before
>Kinda iffy on my first listen of it
>Start to enjoy it more and more with each subsequent listen
>End up really really liking it
>Decide to listen to SWANS EP because /mu/ recommended it
Holy shit. SWANS EP blows Filth out of the fucking water, and it's not even close. Why does /mu/ always talk as if Filth is the superior album when that's so obviously wrong?
>>61445237
Current output
