Swans - My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope to the Sky

Fourteen years on from the last Swans album, 'Soundtracks For the Blind', which was to all extents and purposes their, erm, swansong (sorry) - Michael Gira has reimagined his Swans project and returned to damage our ear drums and darken our souls with a new recording entitled 'My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope To the Sky.'

Now, this title may have you dreaming up the horrendous possibility of Gira coming out and saying - I was an evangelical Christian all along and now that I've got your attention - GOD IS REAL! Of course that is far too far-fetched to be possible and could never happen. Ever.

Fear not, for not only is 'MFWGMUARTTS' (that barely reduced the type effort) an angry, churning, vicious and unmistakably Swansy effort but it is one of the most potent records I've heard all year. The fact that this is not (as Gira has been at great pains to point out) a reunion but rather a new dawn is evidenced as much by the personel as anything. Most obvious and conspicuous by her absence is the non-appearance of Jarboe, an omission which is obviously a shock, but only marginally more so than the incredible 'You Fucking People Make Me Sick' in which weirdie beardie Devendra Banhart's inimitable croon is echoed by Gira's 3 year old daughter singing "I love you/Young flower/Now give me/What is mine” before all hell breaks loose and an industrial deluge rains down crushing all in its path.

Despite the notable Jarboe-less-ness of the record, Gira has penned a wholy worthy addition to the Swans cannon and an album that grows and grows upoon each and every listen (well I'm only up to around 50 so I can't be sure of the exponentiality of this phenomenon, but I can only go on experience). Of course, in between 'Soundtracks...' and 'MFWGMUARTTS' (god bless 'control c') Gira has given us the more pensive and harmonious Angels Of Light - a weighty and precious gift in itself, but even so a new Swans album is something to salivate over and then savour, slowly and guiltily like a good stilton.

Quite simply if you've never come across Swans before (apart from giving yourself 50 lashes) this is a magnificent place to start. Absolutely essential.