Customer Reviews

He Has Left Us Alone But Shafts of Light Sometimes

5 star:		(32)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Yep, the title is a mouthful. Even the abbreviation HHLUABSOLSGTCOOR is a monster...

The Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra and Tra-la-la Band would probably be called a side-project of Godspeed You Black Emperor!. Down from a nine-piece rock orchestra to just three people, GYBE!'s lavish soundscapes are stripped down to the mere basics of piano, violin, and contrabass. Even with the occasional addition of some guitar, drumming, vocals (yes, vocals), radio samples, and clarinet, A Silver Mt. Zion relegates its music to sparse, oppressively sad passages that bleed silent anguish. Compared to the ominous symphonies of GYBE! (whom you probably like if you're checking this out), this music is less foreboding and dark. Instead, it is just sad, like a weight on the soul. Depressing music is often the most beautiful to me, because it functions as an emotional release. This album is beautiful, but it is a distressed beauty that is difficult to listen to sometimes. And what's it all about? The album is an aching dirge for a dead dog named Wanda.

So, you get 47-minutes of long, dreary motivic passages dedicated a dead pet. A tough sell to most people, certainly, and I don't doubt that it in the hands of lesser writing talent something like this would be quite awful. But it is far from any such denigrating adjective. I rank this up with some of the most beautiful music I have.

"Broken chords can sing a little" opens the album with simple and unsettling piano chords and a subtle electronic hum. A crying violin glides into the atmosphere as two strange vocal samples appear in stereo. This sets the tone for the album -- barren, sheer requiems based mostly on piano and violin with some odd tape effects appearing in the background (the whale-like mantra appearing between slow swipes of violin on "For Wanda" makes me shake). "Sit in the middle of three galloping dogs" is slightly more robust, arranging jarring violin strikes against marching drums in a way both disconcerting and weeping. "Movie (never made)" has Efrim actually singing, his voice breaking apart over a simple piano melody, and the band sounds like they are playing in some abandoned cathedral. "13 angels standing guard 'round the side of your bed" is a teary mist of sorrow, pure heart-crushing sadness with sonics that can only be described as profound. The interesting thing is that it doesn't sound like the music is trying to make anyone sad -- it is just unqualified expression.

I wouldn't listen to this if I was ever close to suicide, but for those times when you want something gorgeously melancholy, I can't think of anything better.

For the most part, I am quite wary of artists whose entire careers are lengthy treatises on a single emotion like melancholy or depression. Consequently, my respect for artists like Chan Marshall and Mark Kozelek runs about as deep as my conviction sometimes that they need to both be banished to that Harmony Hut from Addams Family Values for a week or so. So when I first discovered that a few members of Godspeed You Black Emperor! had constructed a side project whose new album was dedicated to guitarist Efrim's late dog Wanda, well, you can understand my skepticism.

Rest assured, however, that the result, A Silver Mt. Zion's He Has Left Us Alone But Shafts of Light Sometimes Grace The Corners of Our Rooms, succeeds wonderfully in what is has set out to accomplish. An almost skeletal album, He Has Left Us Alone... employs little more than piano and violin to create some of the most beautifully bare instrumental pieces I've recently heard. Godspeed minus the bombast and about two-thirds of its members would be a good approximation, but it would miss out on the album's focused sense of grief. Godspeed You Black Emperor paints epic landscapes of sound; this is a musical still life of sadness.

Of the album's eight movements (which make up two larger pieces), "13 Angels Standing Guard Round The Side of Your Bed" is probably the highlight here. For a bunch of avant noodling with tape loops and violins, this is gorgeous stuff. Also of note is "Movie (Never Made)," a song for piano featuring Efrim on vocals, his voice breaking all over the notes. And even the exercise in descending scales (a Godspeed trademark), presented here in the form of "Stumble And Rise On Some Awkward Morning," is a remarkably moving piece. Of course, the album is only strengthened by its abandoned church-like production, which uses echoes to invoke the perfect environment for these songs.

He Has Left Us Alone... may not be an essential purchase for everyone - it's too much of a one-note affair - but it's certainly not just for Godspeed completists. A beautiful, almost ambient expression of pure sorrow, this the perfect album for those who think Godspeed You Black Emperor! would be great if it weren't for all those damn crescendos.

Silver Mount Zion is comprised of three members of GYBE, for a much more empty feeling. Empty, empty empty, is the adjective that I think of mostly when this is playing. The main instruments are violin, piano, drums and contrabass, along with a few vocals and guitar. The band creates a sparse, vast sound and is some of the most depressing stuff I've ever heard, in a beautiful way, of course. And, once again, a band that makes CD titles and song titles this outrageous has got to be good.

The album starts off with a few lonely piano chords and slowly evolves into a song containing piano and violin, and distant, faded vocal radio clips, and staticy, overlapping voices like a radio is picking up severeal different news stations but for some reason they are talking about the same thing.

That leads into "Sit in the Middle of Three Galloping Dogs," a nice song with a violin loop. It's the same violin loop for a while, then it changes and eventually fades out into the next song, "Stumble then Rise on some Awkward Morning", which keeps getting faster and faster, and slowly shifting gears. very creepy.

The next song, "Move (Never Made)" creeps me out. It is just some guy (well, probably one of the band members) with a really bad voice, singing really bizarre lyrics, with a heavy echo, with the bass playing an out-of-rhythm tunes at times. Then, a surreal, eerie piano is played with the finishing touch of the vocals... It sounds like this guy is dying in an abandoned warehouse with his band and they are singing until they die.

After that, you're in desperate need of something incredibly beautiful, and you're going to get it. "13 Angels Standing Guard Round the Side of Your Bed" is by far, the best song on the album. This piece of music just totally astounds me and leaves me breathless every time I listen to it. It boggles my mind how someone can come up with such an arrangement of music and execute and harmonize it so perfectly. If you've ever read something about strange creatures in the middle of the ocean that play the most beautiful music ever and lure you to them and you never ever want to leave and you just sit there for the rest of your life... THIS IS THAT MUSIC. Of course you have to be open minded and in the right mood to get into it, and some might simply say it's boring or not enough going on or repetitive... but I know i'm not the only one who feels the same way about this song. It contains wailing violins and bass lines, but then an unearthly sound that I don't know how it's being created. Maybe it's aleins crying tears of joy because their planet has won a long, horrible war and it's finally over and they have gained freedom and independence. I know, the things I think up are so strange, but I think that describes it pretty good.

The next song is 5 seconds long and doesn't sound like anything. Very strange. On a side note, this band put totally wrong track times on the track listing. They say the 5-second song is 4 minutes, and they say "13 Angels..." is 4 minutes when it's really 7:22. It's like they were too lazy to figure out how long they actually were, and just guessed and rounded off the times because they all end evenly (:00) but when you add them up it's about the same length of the album. I like it.

Anyways, the last 2 songs are more dark violin and piano songs. nothing really different. This album is excellent for Godspeed You Black Emperor fans and anyone who'd like dark, empty music. Buy it now!

Despite what some may say, this album is NOT depressing, unless you consider beauty depressing. Quite frankly, beauty is emotion evoking, and why some people equate emotion with depression is beyond me. I guess on some levels they are right, though. This album tends to make you cry. If not on the first time, it will at some point. Maybe on some dark, lonely night, it'll get you. You'll feel it come over your entire body, linger in your head, and then you'll sink down in your chair or bed, and realize it's beauty. This experience seems to be what some people think of as depressing. This experience makes me glad to be alive, glad to have witnessed the intensity and the lulls. It will be like the greatest kiss you ever get, one that's full of energy, entirely comforting, and the quietest, calmest moment of your life. All associated with Godspeed You Black Emperor!, including gsybe themselves of course, (Set fire to flames, A Silver Mt. Zion) and some just like them (explosions in the sky, mogwai, and to a lesser extent sigur-ros) possess this inexplicable comfort. If you're not afraid to confront your emotions, experience the most beautiful thing of your life, and be totally overcome by this music, then support the band and buy the album. Trust me, the sensation is unlike any other. It's even better than Britney in one those tight outfits, and we all know how good THAT is.

This CD will change your life.

It will make you happier. When you are happy, you will work better, run faster, be smarter. You will succeed where before you had failed.

At the very least, this CD will make you glad to be alive.

The oddly named "A Silver Mt. Zion" are apparently a spin-off project from some band called Godspeed You Black Emperor! (sharing both band members and excessively long names). I heard Mt. Zion before I heard GYBE!, so you can trust me when I say it isn't only for fans of the original band. The music on this CD is haunting, managing to turn simple minimalist sounds into a lush mixture of strings and piano.

Unlike a lot of avant-classical (and I think this CD would fit under that genre), and despite what you might think by the track titles, this isn't music written by someone trying to show how clever they are. It was dedicated to the dying pet of the vocalist, and the songs reflect that fact; they are very emotional, from the hypnotic preaching in "Sit In The Middle Of Three Galloping Dogs", to the beautiful violin of "Thirteen Angels Standing Guard 'Round The Side Of Your Bed".

If you think that there is even the slightest chance you might enjoy this CD, then go buy it. Now.

I first began listening to this album at 2:30am, with the full intention of settling into bed roughly 10 minutes thereafter. Little did I know at the time that this album would grip my by the collar and say "Sit down, and listen. Sleep is no longer important."

GY!BE makes great music. It is a joy to have it hit your ears. Its big, it's loud, and it's epic. It deals with the end of the world, and the major themes of mankind. A Silver Mt. Zion takes GY!BE, pares down the music, and personalizes the message. This is not the world ending, there is no apocalypse here. There is only a dying dog and the sadness of one man.

This is not to say that this album is not reminiscent of its bigger brother. The pretentiousness is still blatant (huge album title, cryptic cover art, indecipherable track titles, etc.), the music still builds its emotional with sparseness in passages, building to climactic crescendos, and so on. These, however, are managed with three instruments and a few tape effects. Unbelievable.

The album is split into two movements, "Lonely as the Sound of Lying on the Ground of an Airplane Going Down," and "The World is SickSICK; (So Kiss Me Quick)." While the first is more Godspeed-esque, with occasional tape-looped speeches, and reverb-laden drumming, the second is, IMO, the finest music to come out of the Godspeed bunch. The canvas starts white, silence. Background noises begin to contribute to the soundscape, finally played over by sparse chords on the organ, a plucked cello, and a violin that makes everything else in life seem a little bit duller next to it. I've never seen Sophie Trudeau, but I would like to thank her, someday, for playing on this album.

This record was also my first time to hear Efrim Menuck sing. His vocal performance is a bit cathartic, and quite nasal (think Wayne Coyne, of The Flaming Lips). His voice has a tremulous quality to it, making him sound almost nervous at being recorded. This, strangely enough, helps to add to the emotional impact of the record, rather than serve as a distraction. He, in the vein of Connor Oberst, actually manages to sound truly saddened by his own music, a feat not easily accomplished, but hauntingly powerful.

This is, to recount, an album riddled with emotion. It bleeds sadness out of every note. It personalizes the message of GY!BE, which makes it even more palatable, but no less dark. GY!BE remind you that the world will end, and perhaps end soon. ASMZ brings that home, reminding you that, as one reviewer said "When the world ends, you end, too."

Sure, there is the outbreak of the occasional major chord, a ray of sunshine in the clouds, but it is brief, and minor chords prevail. It may end on an upbeat, but I can't decipher if ASMZ ending it this way is a touch ironic. The last minute of the album feels anachronistic, a strange ending. Perhaps this is one of the "shafts of light" that still exist after the death of a loved one.

This is a beautiful, sad, enchanting, cathartic, wonderful album. I could write more adjectives, but those seem the most appropriate. I love this music.

this is pretty perfect. much more laidback than the apocalyptic godspeed you black emperor, with percussion only on one of the tracks. efrim sings on one track, which sounds like a cross between low and neil young. another song, '13 angels...' is full of sampled sighs and gasps and sounds a bit like tortoise or papa m. the rest sounds quite like godspeed, but with more emphasis on piano and less on guitar. its all wonderfully graceful and elegant and quite frightening in places. and the packaging is gorgeous; a foil stamped card jacket.

With the Apocalypse on the approach, or so the record would suggest, we find ourselves gridlocked in a hopeful melancholia. A depression sets in, but, as is human nature, we strive on. Though many of my friends think of me as suicidal for listening to this, I must tell them they are missing the perfectly constructed anti-melodies and the evocative effect they possess.

You can almost see the smoke rising from the cigarettes of those huddled in bomb shelters, surrounded by religious paraphenlia as a last resort for hope, when listening to "Move (Never Made)". Each track, though most have no lyrics, has a story arc no matter how truncated the elegant musical arrangements may be.

A Silver Mt. Zion manages to separate itself from its mother band, yet remain close enough to make comparisons - even though they are wholly unnecessary. The members having come from the massive ensemble known as Godspeed, You Black Emperor! pared down the instrumentation while still sparing the full sound necessary for effect. The Apocalypse is just as present in these songs as it is in teh twenty minute beautiful futuristic symphonies composed by Godspeed.

Though the record may limp, wounded and needy, through your head with its lulling ballade of the End Times, there is still an omnipresent sense of frozen hope waiting to be thawed, exposed and utilized. It's a great record for reaching into yourself.

Don't let the silly album title fool you, this disc is quite good. A Silver Mt. Zion is three members of the Montreal band Godspeed You Black Emporor, so it's not a surprise that this sounds a lot like Godspeed You Black Emporor. The main difference between A Silver Mt. Zion and GYBE is that the former is much more laid back and orchestrated, while the latter tends towards the rock side of the spectrum. This album consists of two pieces (indexed as four tracks apice) that are both beautiful and tense. The first (get ready for the pretentious titles again!), "lonely as the sound of lying on the ground of an airplane going down", is the more epic of the two, consisting of both lush orchestration and epic crescendoing rhythms. The latter, "the world is sickSICK; (so kiss me quick)", is much more ambient in nature. Both of these pieces serve as excellent music to lay down and chill out to or to play in the background while reading or typing away at the computer.

The packaging for this CD is excellent (although slightly oversized, so it may not fit in your CD storage product of choice). It comes in a red foil-embossed cardboard sleeve with a nicely designed black and white liner note sheet. The CD itself comes inside a paper sleeve which fits inside the cardboard sleeve (an excellent move, as cardboard sleeves like this tend to damage a CD as it's inserted and removed). Overall, this is an excellent release and the perfect compliment to your GYBE albums.

This is an interesting release. Much more sparse than "F#A#" or "Slow Riot", this Godspeed You Black Emperor! side project by Efrim, Thierry and Sophie is really good. There are eight tracks, that are sparse with eerie dronings, piano, a lot of multi-tracked violin, some vocals, as well as a bit of an electronic edge with a low-fi toy keyboard sampling (anybody played with one of those Casio SK-1 keyboards with the microphone that allows you to sing into and play your voice on the little keyboard?). A good way to describe it would be a mix of Rachel's, Godspeed, Arvo Part, Henryk Gorecki, The Hafler Trio, Black Tape for A Blue Girl, Low and Spiritualized. Check it out.