Every album feels like the end of the road in times when your arms are burning, your legs are strained, and your head is twisted this way and that. Such is life at the PureGym. All these songs could be your last. Birthing, the latest album from Swans, does have a finality to it, intentional or not, for the Michael Gira-led group. Perhaps this is because Gira has centred on tones and talk usually associated with the end times, rather than anything of a literal end. Broken bones, the overwhelming urgency of life in the face of death, but also the charm which separates Swans from preaching to the converted listener. Atmosphere is everything to a band like Swans. A twenty-one-minute-long opener is enough to put off the passive listener. Take the dive into fear, though, do not be afraid of a song which can hold your attention longer than the time it takes to listen to nearly a full Beach Boys album.
Haunting opener The Healers has that essential Swans quality to it. Not only a moving piece, a beautifully constructed instrumental with the terrifying, terrific work expected, but a place to hear Gira beg for the cleanse, this passionate set of metaphors reconstructing the band. I Am a Tower, the intense lead single which positions Gira as an observer of a crumbling world, is laced with wilder, out-there comments which keep his humour alive. That is crucial for a project as heavy as Birthing, an album which is happy to rest on a repeating instrumental halfway through the song, to hammer home the beauty and rage which has formed the very best of Swans’ work. It can be heard on the title track, the minds and limbs Gira sings of are preceded by a crunching, repetitive instrumental, which brings on a chilling urgency.
Those graphic tones Gira presents in the latter stages of Birthing, on Guardian Spirit particularly, feel surplus to requirement. He has touched on those topics before, and all he can do after that is keep the tone, match the feeling of the songs preceding it, and fire in a few similes, synonyms, and scared souls. It works, certainly, and his decision not to trim the fat means even the chewy parts of Birthing are on your mind while a three-minute harmonica instrumental wails on. Where it may lose itself in those latter moments, there is a patience necessary to Birthing which most albums cannot afford. The Merge starts with intensity, with its drumming from Tim Wyskida forming the core. But by the end it takes on a beautiful, flourishing tone, one of hope and desire. It is this optimism, shocking and brief, which plays on the mind.
(Rope) Away does this too. The often-questioning moments which close out Birthing are of a staggering, volatile variety. We should expect nothing less from Gira. Birthing is a staggering piece of work which grows into those lyrical thrills, those lengthy moments which are borderline impossible to pull off so consistently. Yet Swans persevere. There is no doubt Birthing will be defined by the violence, the natural status in a world gone horribly wrong. But amid those moments of carnage are the subtle spots, either of instrumental beauty or the slim fragments of hope. Take a moment to appreciate the beauty of the present while we are still here, while it is still here, to be enjoyed. That should be the message taken from Swans amid the crushed bones, the broken skulls, and the constantly brilliant instrumental scope.
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