SWANS
The Beggar
Mute / Young God Records
Swans are an acquired taste, an institution nonetheless. Challenging, discordant, and often very, very dark. If you are a fan, you are a FAN, and their new album The Beggar sows in the same dark soil of their previous 15 albums.
Tracks are long, hovering around the +/- 10 minute mark with one epic track, “The Beggar Lover (Three),” that clocks in at 43:51 (that’s minutes and seconds, folks!) that makes up the first of two tracks of the second CD’s two-disc release. The track lengths are necessary. It allows each track to evolve, breathe, and plumb the depths of Swan’s experimental nature. The Beggar is less industrial noise than 1983’s Filth and follows more along the lines of 2014’s To Be Kind, a “folksier” approach that might be more accessible to the casual listener. That’s the ruse, though, isn’t it? Swans are never casual. They have something to say.
Popular track “Paradise Is Mine” is deep philosophy about the human condition. After the lyrics, “Awake. Awake. Awake. Awake, to sleep … Is there really a mind?,” Michael Gira repeats the refrain “Am I ready to die?” Experiences are listed that can be interpreted as evolutionary steps towards homo sapien or as Gira’s personal development from an amphibian emerging from the primordial ooze to an entity that questions time and perception, themselves. Or, it’s just about fucking on a beach. “Learn to fuck. Tongues are trained. Fingers Reach. Come to us, on the beach.” Heady stuff to be certain, depending on which way you want to interpret the very dense lyrics.
I am drawn to the droning title track, “The Beggar.” It has all the tasty morsels I want from a Swans composition. Building musically and lyrically, the song is Psalms if Psalms were about the Book of Revelations, and the end of days were about how much suffering one will endure for the love of another. Unrequited, or just horny? It’s raw. It’s poetic. Eight minutes into the 10:15 runtime there is a pained scream as the music builds in an almost Velvet Underground at their drone-iest way and fills space. Is it release? I like this section of the lyrics, “My eyes eroded by derision, they know the purpose of the wind. In every soul there is a craven, supplicating begging shit. But my abjection leads to freedom. My seed is growing and will live,” as it seems like a child has been conceived because of the pain endured. Is that “seed” an actual child, or an idea? A concept of self.
Swans are an institution. Important and difficult to penetrate, but like most literature, deeper meanings and connections can be made. It’s acceptable if you don’t enjoy The Beggar, like many people don’t enjoy Dostoevsky’s Notes From Underground. That doesn’t diminish the art. I haven’t been able to digest the almost two-hour album in a single sitting, but I do keep going back to it. I like the poetry.
Swans are currently on a massive world tour that comes Stateside in September. Remaining concert dates can be found at Young God Records.
