Amazon.co.uk Review
Montreal-based anarchist collective Godspeed You Black Emperor are responsible for making some of the most awe-inspiring symphonic music of the last decade--but on their fourth record,
Yanqui U.X.O, it sounds as if the wind in their sails has dropped from a gale to a breeze. By no means has their resolve faltered: Godspeed are still dedicated to autonomy from a music industry they view as corrupt--witness the sleeve of
Yanqui U.X.O, which features a pen-scrawled chart that financially links major record labels to arms manufacturers and the American military itself. But the music here--recorded, for the first time, with Chicago-based producer Steve Albini--lacks the inspiring climaxes and dramatic manifestos that characterised the band's earlier works. The second movement of "09-15-00" displays a serene, windswept beauty. But all too often, individual instruments--celestial guitar roar, keening violin, martial drum signatures--aren't given enough space to breathe, gelling into one characterless drone. And with no atmospheric field recordings to section up its five plodding orchestral passages,
Yanqui U.X.O begins to feel like an awfully long 75 minutes. Only the closing "Motherfucker = Redeemer" finds the band hitting their stride, but by then, you're mute with surprise that Godspeed have turned out an album that's anything other than totally excellent. --
Louis Pattison
CD Description
From the bombs dropping on the cover to the slow buildups towards destruction and post-rock beauty in the compositions,this is Godspeed You Black Emperor at its most stripped-down, straightforward, and unsparing. Indie-rock icon Steve Albini produced YANQUI U.X.O., and his trademark extreme dynamics suit this shadowy Canadian collective well, weighing downon the roots of their whisper-to-frenzy style so they can freely branch off into new realms. The opener "09-15-00" departs into twangy, lounge-like territory not out of place for a Sergio Leone-cum-David Lynch nightmare (though it's apparently about Israel). "Rockets Fall on Rocket Falls" raises dark towers from shaky foundations of shivery Phillip Glass-style arpeggios, while the lead-heavy drones in "Motherf***er = Redeemer" sink into pools of near-total abstraction.
Godspeed cultists are generally divided on this album, though few debate its unusually high--even for the band--apocalyptic gloom quotient. This is probably not an advisable first listen for anyone easily swayed by morose music, but for the brave listener ready to aurally journey to the horizon of man's tragic destiny, this crushing work of post-rock art should carry them long and far.
~ Godspeed You! Black Emperor
~ !
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~ Godspeed You! Black Emperor
~ Silver Mount Zion
