Music Reviews

First of all, that was one hell of a title to write down, but I can gladly report that the music really fricking showed up for it. The legendary post-rock outfit are back better then ever and after a 4 year hiatus decides to drop a new full length LP with a brand new set of skull-crushing music and trust me when I say, that I’ll gladly have my skull crushed if this is what it would sounds like.

Now one thing you have to understand about Godspeed You! is that they make albums as one monumental larger-then-life expirience of a track, usually diving the tracklisting into four major segments. Now this album gives a little spin on this with the tracklisting still having four segments, but the first and the third one having the majority of the songs on here and the second and the final one being just singular songs, so expect me not to go that much in depth on those. But anyway, let’s start with the first bunch of tracks, shall we? If the first segment manages to prove something to me, it’s that they still fricking got it – I’ve been pretty mixed on the last few efforts in the band’s catalog, so hearing something like this again really reminded me why I love the band’s music so much in the first place. Essenitally the first segment consist of four major tracks each leading into the other and building on intensity until the inevitable explosion in the final leg – the musical pallete is as tasteful as ever, the instrumentals sound fresh, they sound dirty yet heavenly, they build like a giant wall of noise ready to swallow you and after the they fade in the second to last track, the last track is there to comfort you with there being no instruments, just the sounds of the birds singing, before the second segment kicks in. Now the second segment is purely just one song that focuses on more the atmospheric side of things, after the pure musical equivalent of torture that is the first segment. But even though it’s not as grand nor as explosive as the first segment, it still remains one of my favorite segments here. The distant marching drums with the dusty and atmospheric strings just add so much to the track, it really prepares you for what’s to come next. The third segment is something else, that really is the full package you came to love from the band over the years, the two songs alone are enough to make a full-grown man cry, truly the definition of hope. I was genuinely holding tears back by the end of it, the unease and despair that follows you throughout the first song that evolves into this beam of hope is just magical. It uses already familiar sounds and instruments to create something beautiful and at the end of the day that’s what I love the most about the band’s music – turning despair into hope and this segment is the embodiment of that. The final segment or song, however you wanna look at it, serves as a nice conclusion to the album, being a slow-burn fade out with noisy instrumentation wrapped in an orchestral accompaniment. After a few minutes of that the song, again, end on a hopeful orchestral note and the album ends.

Sometimes, an album just doesn’t need words to portray a feeling or even many complex emotions – sometimes the instrumentation speaks louder then words and this is definetly one of those instances. Because of that there really isn’t a way for me to explain with words the true musicalship this album achieves, so you’ll just have to take my word for it, this album really is larger then life, definetly one of the band’s greater accomplishments.

Strong 8/10