Article
Michael Robinson

Albums
34423
The Analog Session
ASC
Black Mental vs L. H. Path
Dewa Budjana
Cam Butler
Caragnano & Dozzy
Digitonal
D'Onofrio & Lyn
Dronelock and Ontal
Harris Eisenstadt
Elian
The Eye Of Time
Kit Wilmans Fegradoe
Forrest Fang
Godspeed You! Black E.
Wayne Horvitz
Huntsville
HVOB
Labfield
Monobody
Oscar Mulero
M. Ostermeier
Eliesha Nelson
offthesky
Papir
Piano Interrupted
Qibe
Re-UP
Bruno Sanfilippo
Martin Schulte
Patrice Scott
Soft Machine
Matt Starling
stilllife
Mark Wingfield
Toshiyuki Yasuda
zmi

Compilations / Mixes
BamaLoveSoul On Deck 3
Embark 05
Nummer Eins

EPs / Cassettes / DVDs / Mini-Albums / Singles
Dominik Eulberg
eyesix
Jones & Gregson
Pavemental
Soul Clap / Sphynx
Andrew Weathers
Jeremy Young

Godspeed You! Black Emperor: 'Asunder, Sweet And Other Distress'
Constellation

When occasion permits, I'll reacquaint myself with one of my favourite box sets, King Crimson's The Great Deceiver, a four-CD collection featuring live 1973-74 recordings of the Fripp-Wetton-Cross-and-Bruford unit. Issued in 1992, the set offers one of the compelling arguments on behalf of that incarnation as the most incendiary of the Crimson bands, especially when its playing is at times so ferocious it beggars belief. I'm reminded of that collection as I listen to Godspeed You! Black Emperor's ‘Asunder, Sweet And Other Distress,' the Montreal outfit's sixth full-length and excellent follow-up to 2012's Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend! There are moments on the new album, which the group assembled between late-2013 and 2014, that are as volcanic as those on The Great Deceiver, moments where the music rises to such a feverish, cataclysmic pitch that it feels a hair's breath away from exploding.

The similarities don't end there: just as that version of Crimson rendered meaningless any attempt to reduce its music to the prog-rock label, so too does Godspeed's attack leave any such attempt in the dust. Yes, the group plays epic, long-form compositions, and, yes, ‘Asunder, Sweet And Other Distress' deploys electric guitars and strings as its frontline, but the album material might best be described as raw and incendiary instrumental music and left at that; put simply, genre concerns fall by the wayside as the group works through the set's forty minutes. On this recording, Godspeed's sound swells to behemoth-like proportions, with the music powered by three guitarists (David Bryant, Efrim Manuel Menuck, Michael Moya), two drummers (Aidan Girt, Timothy Herzog), and two bassists (Mauro Pezzente on electric, Thierry Amar on bass and contrabass) in addition to Sophie Trudeau (violin) and Karl Lemieux (16mm film projections).

That we're in for a heavy ride is intimated by the opening seconds of “Peasantry or ‘Light! Inside of Light!'” when a plodding drum pattern is joined by a crushing riff voiced by guitars and strings that grows ever noisier as the minutes pass. The band enters into full-blown Godspeed mode as atonal squalls of six-strings fill the air and a celebratory theme suggestive of the Scottish highlands soars above the fray. Things gradually settle down as the music decompresses for a hypnotic, swoon-inducing coda, after which “Lambs' Breath,” ten minutes of ponderous, improv-styled dronescaping, follows without pause. Harmonically reminiscent of Ligeti and Penderecki, the piece plays like smoldering ruins rendered into musical form until the music strips down to a wavering drone during the closing minutes (on vinyl, the piece becomes a run-on groove at the side's end). Rising from the ashes, the churning noisescape “Asunder, Sweet” expands in strength and scope over the course of its brief, six-minute run before “Piss Crowns Are Trebled,” a classic slice of Godspeed business that sees guitar and violin melodies declaiming ecstatically alongside a bruising 3/4-time bass-and-drum pulse, takes over.

April 2015