The Seer
A NOTE FROM MICHAEL GIRA “The Seer took 30 years to make. It’s the culmination of every previous Swans album as well as any other music I’ve ever made, been involved in or imagined. But it’s unfinished, like the songs themselves. It’s one frame in a reel. The frames blur, blend and will eventually fade. The songs began on an acoustic guitar, then were fleshed out with (invaluable) help from my friends, then were further tortured and seduced in rehearsals, live and in the studio, and now they await further cannibalism and force-feeding as we prepare to perform some of them live, at which point they’ll mutate further, endlessly, or perhaps be discarded for a while. Despite what you might have heard or presumed, my quest is to spread light and joy through the world. My friends in Swans are all stellar men. Without them I’m a kitten, an infant. Our goal is the same: ecstasy!" HOW THE SONGS CAME TO BE The songs The Seer, Ave. B Blues, Avatar, and The Apostate were developed organically as a group in rehearsals and on tour. They morphed constantly throughout the last series of Swans tours, and were captured and lovingly adorned in the studio. The remaining songs on the album were developed from the ground up in the studio with the participation and input of all the contributing musicians, guided by an invisible hand... Recorded at Studio P4 and Andere Baustelle in Berlin, by Kevin McMahon and at Marcata Studio, Gardiner, NY, by Kevin McMahon. Additional recording at Trout Recording, Brooklyn, NY, engineer: Bryce Goggin. Mixed by Kevin McMahon at Marcata. Produced by Michael Gira. FULL CREDITS SWANS Michael Gira voice, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, harmonica, casio, sounds Norman Westberg electric guitar, voice Christoph Hahn lap steel guitars; electric guitar, voice Phil Puleo drums, percussion, hammer dulcimer, voice Thor Harris drums, percussion, orchestral bells, hammer dulcimer, handmade violin thing, vibraphone, piano, clarinet, voice Christopher Pravdica bass guitar, voice, incredible handshake Honorary Swan: Bill Rieflin piano, organ, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, drums, percussion, casio, synthesizer, bass guitar, voice, bird idea SPECIAL GUESTS Karen O lead vocal on Song for a Warrior (Karen appears courtesy Interscope Records) Al and Mimi of Low co-vocals on Lunacy Jarboe backing vocals and voice collage on Piece of the Sky and backing vocals on The Seer Returns Seth Olinsky, Miles Seaton, Dana Janssen (Akron/Family) backing vocals on Piece of the Sky Caleb Mulkerin and Colleen Kinsella of Big Blood accordion, vocals, dulcimer, guitar, piano and assorted other instruments on the Seer Returns Sean Mackowiak (the grasshopper) acoustic and electric mandolins, clarinet, various songs Ben Frost fire sounds (acoustic and synthetic) on Piece of the Sky Iain Graham bagpipes on The Seer Bruce Lamont horns on The Seer Bob Rutman steel cello on The Seer Cassis Staudt accordion various songs Eszter Balint violin, various songs Jane Scarpatoni cello various songs Kevin McMahon additional drums on the Seer Returns, electric guitar, sounds on various songs Bryce Goggin piano on Song for a Warrior Stefan Rocke contra bassoon on the Seer Produced by Michael Gira. Recorded at Studio P4 and Andere Baustelle in Berlin, by Kevin McMahon, assistants Marco and Boris, and at Marcata Studio, Gardiner, NY, by Kevin McMahon. Additional recording at Trout Recording, Brooklyn, NY, engineer: Bryce Goggin, assistant: Adam Sachs. Mixed by Kevin McMahon at Marcata. Mastered by Doug Henderson at Micro-Moose Berlin. Pre-mastering by Jamal Ruhe at West Westside Music. Artwork: Paintings and Swans photo portraits by Simon Henwood.
Swans are a band that conjure primal forms of power. Their second studio album since re-forming is among the group's longest and it manages to expand on their sound while simultaneously summarizing everything they've recorded before.
Like his greatest compositions, Michael Gira’s career has been a steady, ominous crescendo. Granted, he’s never been known for quietude. Starting with the first, early-’80s incarnation of Swans—a noise ensemble that terrorized New York’s post-No Wave scene, and made Sonic Youth sound like bratty siblings by…
Nothing else in your record collection will come close to The Seer’s power, intelligence, or primal energy. We recommend it as vehemently as we warn you of its existence.
The words may as well be a manifesto for Swans, Gira’s soul-eating New York noise outfit of no little renown, reactivated in 2010 after 13 years of limbo.
In music, "lengthy" doesn't necessarily equal "epic." But in the case of The Seer, the 12th studio album from experimental post-punk act Swans, the two terms are basically interchangeable.
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With a running time of two hours, Swans' second album since the project's reactivation in 2010 is something of an endurance test. Yet, given band leader Michael Gira's claim that it's the culmination of everything he's ever done or dreamed of doing, such excess is understandable – necessary, even.
Having (temporarily?) retired his Angels of Light band alias and its bleak balladeer mode, Michael Gira is now two albums deep into the bleaker misanthropy of his seminal Swans project.
The second record by the New York post-punks since they reformed in 2010, ‘The Seer’ sees the now-fifty-eight-year-old Michael Gira on tyrannically capricious form.
The heaviest band in the world (by some estimations) return with an album that should win them new fans, writes <strong>Dave Simpson</strong>
Not many albums get the kind of progressive documentation that The Seer received prior to its release. There was a live album earlier this year (We Rose From Your Bed With The Sun In Our Head) that featured almost an hour’s worth of material that ended up on The Seer. There were acoustic demo bonus
Swans - The Seer review: Swans unleash a new brand of hell on Earth: a feverish, post-apocalyptic beast that took thirty years to craft.