TO BE KIND

Album of the year 2014, Michael Gira has once again led his legendary band Swans through the making of a masterpiece, and another in the vein of "Soundtracks For The Blind" and "The Seer" specifically. "To Be Kind" mainly hinges on Gira having not forgotten the power of brutal drums and bass from the early days of the band, slumming around New York City playing their industrial-via-No Wave to often less than receptive audiences in self imposed sweat loges, while vehemently hating the other No Wave bands for admittedly no apparent reason. Here, this sonic brutality is sent through the ringer of the epic, dark, horrifying, and varied take on post rock the band and most of Gira's side projects have been doing since "Soundtracks", in the early days of the genre. Right from the throbbing bass that opens the opener, it is clear that perfection was achieved once more. The double track "Bring the Sun"/"Toussaint L'Ouverture" is the centrepoint of the opus, with the former a powerful and epic piece of drumwork, leading into the crazed darkness of the latter. This is followed with "Some Things We Do", a great closer for CD1 and what some commercials I've seen would sound like if done in a dystopia. CD2 is no slacker, either, with "She Loves Us" an excellent example of post rock done by way of Aphrodite's Child's "The Capture of The Beast", ever strange and seemingly crawling with chains. And "Oxygen" proves a surprisingly good track; there is a reason, after all, it has gotten a single release with several remixes of itself. The vocals of Gira and the supporting chorus just make this album, in the end, more than the instrumentation. Swans just continue their run of outstanding experimental albums, crafting a top release of this year, of all post rock, of all their own records. And this beast shows no signs of stopping. Their future, and so ours, is bright and unpredictable.