Customer Reviews

How I Loved You

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The fact of the matter is that this album is full of good songs, and speaking about them in the manner of the previous reviewer does them a disservice. You don't have to like the swans, you don't have to own anything m. gira has ever done before. If you like honest, challenging, original music, rooted as firmly in Americana as post-punk art rock, you'll probably enjoy this album to no end. Don't let the counter-culture, i-was-underground-when-you-were-buying-NKOTB types scare you off from a really worthwhile and gorgeous record.

Michael Gira's Angels of Light is essentially a collection of very masculine lullabyes. Generally the songs contain the hypnosis that was utilized in his earlier swans albums but the sonic scale and the attention to detail, both lyrically and structurally has been evolved. What does that mean? I don't know. But I like to think of evil cowboys alone on the prairie at night when I listen to this.

It's hard to believe that this album is done by Michael Gira after listening to Swans first album, Filth, with its grungy, grinding guitar and shouted, angry lyrics. But his maturity from Swans through Angels of Light is clearly apparent. This album has a meditative vibe, has incredible sound and the music is crafted very skilfully. The lyrics are pure Gira, about pain, suffering and the down side of the human condition. Sometimes the beautiful acoustic guitars contrast with the harshness of the lyrics. This album has a few songs that stretch out longer than their New Mother album, reminding me of later Swans. This is music that demands to be paid attention to. If you're reading this review, then go and buy this CD. It is well worth it.

I own all Angels releases and many SWANS. This is my favorite Angels release so far. Of all of Gira's recent recordings, I think this one is the most consistent. Gira mostly stays within the bounds of what he does best -- intense, hypnotic and strangely beautiful songs that dwell in a disturbingly ambiguous emotional realm.

Michael Gira's second "Angels Of Light" album returns to the same organic roots of its predecessor, but this time the songs are longer and more sprawling without an increase in structural complexity. Pretty much as close as you could get to a Swans Unplugged album, "How I Loved You" is by no means a poor or substandard offering, but it does not achieve the compact and distilled beauty unveiled so magnificently on "New Mother". The shorter and simpler songs work better here, achieving greater emotional resonance than those that return Gira to the territory of the ten minute epic.

2nd effort from Michael Gira and company is years best so far. There is absolutely no resemblance here to early Swans, for the tunes here are more mellow and acoustic. You can't compare this to The Body Lovers either for the songs on this album are actual songs, with singing, played on real instruments. Rather, imagine like Johnny Cash with excellent musicians having a psychotic episode. Tracks like Evangeline and My Sweet Suicide, though slow and acoustic with pretty female backing vocals, pack more wallup than a train crashing into a mall. Listening to this record is like watching a nuclear bomb exploding in slow motion.

One of the hardest things is to try and explain exactly what is going on here to the uninitiated...I really doubt than anyone who has never heard the Swans would really understand this album. The lyrics would come across as pretentious and silly, while the music would seem long, repetitive and devoid of any real resolution.

The problem is than the content of the songs, which seem to be acoustic ballads of pain, anguish and anger, leads one to think one listens to them the same way one would listen to standard blues/country/folk songs. Really, this album is a continuation of the Swans later work, more than the first _Angels of Light_ album was. To listen to these songs the same way one listens to, say, Johnny Cash, would be a mistake. Instead, the listener has to understand that these are really soundscapes, pure sculptures of sound, instead than straightforward songs. No one can cover these songs--anyone showing up at open mic night with a guitar who tries to sing "New City in the Future" will deserve the rocks thrown at their head. But these soundscapes are different from the washes of distorted and manipulated samples on _Soundtracks for the Blind_. Rather, these soundscapes are made with instruments we usually assume we know and understand, such as guitar, lap steel--leading to the confusion.

My advice to someone interested in the _Angels of Light_ but unfamiliar with the particular demands placed on the listener by the work of M. Gira? Buy the album. Listen to it many times. But do not try to understand or interpret. These songs are impressionistic sketches of an emotion, or a complex structure of conflicting emotions, felt by Gira and translated into sound. Sometimes the lyrics imply a story, or implicate an individual, or map out a relationship, but don't pay too much attention or you'll get distracted. These songs work best when administered straight to the subconscious. Just listen, and let feelings and images flow over and through you. Don't worry--sometimes you might be scared, or angry, or sad, but if it gets too intense just remember--it's only music.

Angels Of Light's second album opens with the melodious Evangeline which is grave, somber and simultaneously uplifting somehow. These complex sound sculptures comprise conflicting emotions - characteristic of all Gira's work - but they're not necessarily impenetrable or inaccessible to those unfamiliar with his oeuvre. In fact, I can easily see a track like Untitled Love song being appreciated as just that - a simple love song.

Less easy to grasp, "My True Body" represents the third in a trilogy initiated by Where Does A Body End (on Great Annihilator) and Where Does Your Body Begin (on Drainland). Poetic expressions & lyrical twists abound, like these wry words in Public Embarrassment Blues:

"Tell me you love me
But not very much
Don't bother with reasons
Just go."

The stanza echoes the sentiment of the song "Green Eyes" on Nick Cave's album The Boatman's Call.

Overall I find How I Loved You less satisfying than New Mother. Only the tracks Evangeline and Two Women rival the magnificence of his masterpieces like The Garden Hides The Jewel, Song For My Father, Angels of Light, This Is Mine and Forever Yours on the first album.

The aforementioned two songs however are reason enough to acquire this album since they radiate Gira's magic at its most moving. As one of those heretics who consider The Burning World one of the best albums Swans ever made, I am pleased with the direction Angels Of Light have taken.

I also recommend the 2008 album We Are Him and of his earlier work, Ten Songs for Another World by World of Skin, Swans' Various Failures and for the intrepid prepared to venture into the experimental, Number One of Three by The Body Lovers.

It's hard to do justice when trying to describe an album like this. It ranges from soft, subtle and beautiful to angry, violent and pounding . . . yet always flows and makes sense. Gira's lyric writing ability is, as usual, brilliant and the songs are as well.

The short and simple of it; Buy this album, you won't be disapointed.

Love songs? Acoustic balladry? To a certain degree, yes. Morelike, an enchanting voyage down the dark and melancholy. Song #1, Evangeline is 2nd best song of the year. Other highlights include #2 Untitled Love Song and #7 My Sweet Suicide.