Swans – Deliquescence (2017)

May 1, 2020

I caught Swans on their final tour and was very disappointed to find that they had run out of copies of this hand made gem before the date I attended. Since then, I have been slowly but surely telling myself “one day, one day” but lets be honest, I’m never going to pay Discogs collectors prices to silly pricks who are just tryna scalp me.

So, I’m afraid, I have gone against Gira’ wishes and have found a YouTube rip of this, which in all fairness, sounds absolutely fucking gorgeous. Deliquescence rivals The Glowing Man. Real talk. It’s worth checking out this 2hr 35min album (yes!) for the 45min long opener “The Knot”, which is basically an album in its own right – words cannot adequately describe the journey that the track takes you on.

The other exclusive tracks for this release pale a bit in comparison, “Deliquescing” is actually stunning in its own way, but I’m unsure if this just becomes part of one of the “Clouds…” tracks on the main record (I’ll have to check). “The Man Who Refused To be Unhappy” is a more restrained romp. Closing the deal is the whole “Bring The Sun” into “Glowing Man” 36min epic which closes the record of the same name (“Finally, Peace” aside), but this time you’ve got Paul Wallfisch on the organ, giving it an even more epic feel. Its a shame they never recorded a studio album with Wallfisch during this time.