Best Songs from Swans' Greed
Greed is the third studio album by American experimental rock band Swans. It was released in 1986, through record label K.422. Greed marks the slow turning point for Swans away from the harsh, brutal noise rock of prior releases, and is also the first Swans album to contain contributions from Jarboe.
A violent industrial song that is simply amazing. The beat is better than anything on the first three albums by quite a lot, with the synthesizers to be perfect for the song, being a mix of powerful and abrasive. The song is unapologetically heavy the entire way through, and is easily one of the nastiest sounding songs in the band's career
The lack of percussion is an interesting thing for the band to do, considering how central to their core sound it was on their previous 2 albums. The vocals are extremely eerie and intense, with the lyrics being the standard sort of brutality that early Swans was known for. The repetitive, creeping piano makes this song incredibly unsettling.
I like the gaps in which there is no sound at all, signifying the change of sound the band had. Rather than an impenetrable wall of sound, everything is used very sparingly here, with little other than the droning vocals and minimalistic beat that the song has.
I really like the beat here, being more clear and less noisy than most others, while still keeping that strong sense of unease that permeates the album. It gets to the point where the drumming almost has a hypnotic effect to it, further established by the much more softly spoken vocals.
I find the addition of the harmonicas to be pretty unique, yet the way they're implemented to basically be what you'd expect from an early Swans album, eerie and downright miserable. There's something almost nauseating about this song and its ability to stay in your head for ages. The additional drum beats that come in just past the halfway mark don't make matters any easier either, being equally as unpleasant and offputting as everything else, which makes for an extremely interesting listen.
Edit: Wow, didn't realise that the harmonica was actually female vocals
The female vocals provide some incredible atmosphere, being eerie and almost ethereal in the way the production for them is. I also find the actual singing on the track to be unique when put up against the previous albums' material.
This song sounds like a less heavy version of something from Cop. The droning vocals and the noisier percussion reflect this particularly well. The song becomes especially chilling near the end, where each note is sustained far more, becoming more and more desperate each time, until it eventually sounds like the mutterings of a madman.