Favorite Bands?

[Karnos]

Quote Originally Posted by unknown";p=&quot

they are indeed a metal band. Although their latest efforts have been focusing more on more on their dark ambient side, it's still very metal. don't bother looking for their cds in stores...you won't find them. Your best bet would be online (like The End Records Omega) or downloading it with DC++, mIRC, or whatever program you use. or if you have AIM, I'd be more than happy to send it to you

Thanks for the heads up! I use soulseek

[The Silent One]

O.K., my personal line-up:

Technically, I like anything that is either actually musical or interesting. Therefore I nominate the below bands.

The Decemberists are very flexible, and simply so entertaining. "Odalisque" is a dark indie-rock gem. The cynicism in "Los Angeles, I'm Yours" is irresistable. And "On the Bus Mall" is somber wet flourishing. And lest we forget the "Mariner's Revenge Song"! To perform this live you would have to be a compleat drama geek, but the studio version is, in a way, spine-tingling. But even greater as a whole are their albums Casaways and Cutouts is absolutely magnificent, and Picaresque is solid gold. Even Her Majesty, their least coherent album, has songs with great single potential, such as the solemn, soft-spoken, bleak "The Bachelor and the Bride". Then there are the EPs: The Tain is based of of an Irish myth cycle, and at 18 minutes long it's their longest song...cycle? And it's i still catchy. And 5 Songs, wonderfully, has six. Poppier, and yet it does give you a perspective on their later work.

Swans are perhaps the most evil-sounding band inrecorded history that actually sounds good. Their first EP was like Joy Division, Current 93, Coil, and some unheard-of experimental jazz band playing in hell. Imagine it. Their first LP, Filth, however, nearly borders on the unlistenable, but pulls through. Their next few releases were almost farcical, yet utterly terrifying.Cop is pure, vicious noise. The Young God EP is no doubt their nastiest; Listen to their live 1984 version of "Raping a Slave" in Berlin on Body to Body, Job to Job. It's loud as a tidalwave breaking, but hypnotic, mesmerising. So is the truly monstrous A Screw 12'' and "Time is Money (Bastard)", which is pure abuse set to a disco beat. Then Jarboe came along. Now the ugly duckling is a marvelous swan, but with even sharper fangs. After Jarboe's arrival, Gira's sound became mellower, but still was terrifying. So was her's. Case in example that the song "Killing for Company" from 1996's The Great Annihilator is just as strong as their earliest work. Just listen. For starters, the aforementioned The Great Annihilator, Various Failures, and Children of God. Advance in this order: Soundtracks for the Blind, Swans are Dead, Feel Good Now, Greed/Holy Money, Public Castration is a Good Idea, and Cop/Young God or Filth/Body to Body, Job to Job.

[More to come...]

[ventriloquist]

Do any of you guys listen to Univers Zero? It strikes me as something people here would be into....

[unknown]

I definitely agree on Swans. Very accurate description

[SwansSoilMe/SwansSaveMe]

Hey, here's where I belong...

Swans are one of my Top 5 artists ever in any medium, in terms of sheer importance at the very least. They went where I've heard no one go before in music, certainly. Maynard James Keenan, of Tool, boweth down unto Swans... And do you know: They never made a record that actually depressed me (whereas a couple of King Crimson's songs do, because of the chords or something). Swans are savagery and onward to a haunting "beauty" and depth unmatched. Michael Gira's intuitive psychological insight is simple and staggering. His was a real catharsis, it's so easy to tell. (He's fairly sane at this moment.) Jarboe is the darkest female presence in music as well. But flexible and human and smart.

The other 5% of Swans' lyrics were more or less political/social. It's amazing when you read the lyrics along with the music, though they're hearable without reading. It comes across as the starkest poetry(?) -- or actually just something that someone needed to say. What the hell else still needs to be said anymore? And in such a powerful way, with a lot of care what went into the actual art of their music. That's why they're in my Top 5, right along with, well...Samuel Beckett. Or Ligotti.

Yes, I have all Univers Zero. Art Zoyd were better in terms of being a consistently viable entity for a longer period, not getting stuck.

The darkest intentionally "evil" music out there is Shub-Niggurath. Expert stuff, and it can actually scare (I mean, we know the French can't rock & roll). Gira's post-Swans experiments were truly harrowing. He and Jarboe are still going, though separately. Read my Amazon reviews on all this if you want... I'm trying to get into Gyorgy Ligeti of late.

There's a Dutch band called Blast that's the most complex avant-progressive rock I've ever heard. Overall, the Americans have caught up so well, though: to wit, Thinking Plague, 5uu's, and Motor Totemist Guild.

I'm all over the place musically, and also go in for the extreme other half of my self, the light as opposed to the dark. Standouts are Deuter, Jon & Vangelis, Daevid Allen, etc.

[The Silent One]

True. "Killing for Company" is the perfect image of shear loneliness. "(She's a) Universal Emptiness" is the epitome of a good folk-rock song. Even the abraisive Young God EP has its moments of catharsis. On the soul-eating "Raping a Slave", Gira's practically sobbing in self-loathing. It's marvelous.

"Eat it out..."
TN-S-SO

[Freyasfire]

I'd have to recommend Devil Doll as having a very Ligotti-ish sort of atmosphere. From artwork, to lyrics, to instrumentation this band is the epitome of music inspired by several forms of horror, from the psychological to the supernatural.

BTW, so many of you have very good taste in music!

[SwansSoilMe/SwansSaveMe]

Devil Doll, eh? I wish I had something else by them other than Sacreligium, which I find derivative and almost clownish in its over-the-top attempt to appeal to horror fans. Maybe it's the foreign thing, I don't know. Other bands from overseas I love to death.

[Freyasfire]

Quote Originally Posted by SwansSoilMe/SwansSaveMe";p=&quot

Devil Doll, eh? I wish I had something else by them other than Sacreligium, which I find derivative and almost clownish in its over-the-top attempt to appeal to horror fans. Maybe it's the foreign thing, I don't know. Other bands from overseas I love to death.

Devil Doll are definitely over the top, but that is one of the reasons I like them. I'm all for ostentation in music (in all forms of art, really...)

[The New Nonsense]

Has anyone heard of the band "Bohren and the Club of Gore"? Fantastic stuff. Most of their work sounds like it could easily be the soundtrack to a David Lynch film. All instrumental. It's very slow and dark like a dream that has subtly warped and shifted into a nightmare without one realizing it. The albums range from dark-ambient to what I can only call "jazz-noir". I highly recommend it. Here's a link to the band's site...

http://www.bohrenundderclubofgore.de/html/index.html