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Old 09.21.2017, 09:05 AM   #410
Severian
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Quote:
Originally Posted by gogologogolo
I disagree. For instance, I felt that their album Allelujah really broke some new ground, and I can still go back and listen to that album feeling like it's something unique. A lot of post-rock tends to blend together in my mind, much of it is formulaic and overdone, so I'm interested in the stuff that can break out of that mold.

Again, I don't dislike the album, I just think they've done better.


Hmm... At first I was pretty into “Allelujah! Don’t Bend, Ascend!” but after a while it started to sound a bit like a series of not-quite-finished thoughts from the “Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven” era. It still knocked the shit out of a lot of other indie-and-post-rock-type stuff from that year (2012, yeah?) and it had some seriously cool moments, but I think my opinion on it now is that it didn’t really add anything too substantial to the band’s canon or identity.

Granted, it’s been a while since I listened to it, so I should probably revisit it before saying much, but that’s how I kinda left things with that album. I do feel that it was better than the follow-up — “Asunder...” — but I think that album was more fully formed. And actually I think one of the reasons I like “Allelujah...” more is that it has sort of a spontaneous, jammy feel to it, which actually is/was kind of a new thing for the band if you think about it. All their albums are just so meticulously arranged and for that one to have more of a “fuck it let’s play stuff” feel may well qualify as “breaking new ground” — not in a general sense, but for GY!BE.

I’ve listened to two tracks from the new album and I’m a little disappointed. Like you said, it’s not bad, but it’s also not particularly good for a band like this. I’m sure there’s some genuine fire and fury behind the intention of the music, but it doesn’t really come across as being particularly fiery or furious because the music itself sounds so freaking much like GY!BE. This isn’t a bad thing — most bands sound like themselves, after all, and I like the band’s sound and approach in general, but after 20 years and one lengthy break-up/hiatus-type-thing, it might be nice to hear a slightly different side of GY!BE.

It’s hard not to think of Portishead when talking about older (or, I guess, more seasoned) bands returning from a hiatus and making something new and vital. For all the bands that have gone away and come back over the last 10-15 years, no band has returned quite as well as Portishead, whose “comeback” album mixed some of the groups’s more traditional elements with a whole MESS of new ideas and weird-ass sounds and styles, deconstructing and rebuilding their sonic palette in a very modern way. And “Third” did the impossible in that it’s actually a better and more interesting album than either of the classics that preceded it.

I think Godspeed had it in them to make a “Third”-level late career masterwork that stayed true to their essence, but also took their sound into new and different territory, but apparently I was either just plain wrong, or the members have no desire to use the GY!BE name to do any such experimentation or reinvention.

Still... it’s GY!BE. They’re a good band, and their music will probably always be good. But I think I’m done holding out hope that it will ever sound truly great, or essential, or brilliant again. But at least we have their first four albums, and we can listen to those and think back to when that particular sound did indeed feel vital and urgent and powerful. It’s more than most bands manage in a career.
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