Godspeed You! Black Emperor
After so many years of radio silence, they came roaring back at the Masonic Temple. I really missed them. For a longer while than I’m willing to admit, their music helped me along, pushing me forward. Even the sheer fact they existed for so long as a near-anonymous collective who played 20 minute plus long songs is short of incredible. What’s even more incredible is how all of their New York shows sold out in about 3.5 seconds.
Naturally I was thrilled to see them live for the first time, having missed their concerts when they were together due to laziness and general forgetfulness. Their venue choice of a Temple felt additionally fitting. Seeing a packed audience, I wanted to take a picture of the place and send the photography to Glenn Branca, politely asking him to quit writing doom-laden Op-Ed pieces in the New York Times. I wanted him to see his idea of an orchestra of rock did not end with him, but continued on in the spirit of a bunch of Canadians, who removed even ego from their music.
Eric Chenaux music didn’t express any form of humility. As I heard his opening set, I kept on trying to think of reasons why it wasn’t good. Could it be due to the acoustics? No, I heard him alright. Perhaps it might be a bit intimidating for anyone opening up for a giant band with a devout cult following, and here you are some guy they’ve never heard of, and you have to wow them. For a moment I thought this might be true. John Fahey did solo guitar work too but after most of his live shows his record sales decreased. But no, mostly Chenaux’s set suffered from obsessive self-indulgence. That struck me as particularly disappointing, as he had some extremely interesting sustained tones and drones underneath aimless guitar strumming. Had he simply stripped away the show-off nature of his playing, and instead focused on the quieter aspects of the sound, I might have enjoyed his set much more. When he ended, I think several people around me murmured “Thank God” through insincere applause.
GYBE didn’t disappoint. As they started up, I wondered what might have convinced them to take such a long hiatus from doing shows. Sure, they had a million side projects (Fly Pan Am, A Silver Mount Zion, Set Fire to Flames, the list continues) which took up some time. Perhaps the sound they explored might have tired itself out. Their last album got universal praise, but their style got co-opted by countless less talented musicians. Criticism (lazy criticism) began circulating about their over-reliance on crescendos and constant builds.
While crescendos were in place for their performance, they explored some of their quieter pieces as well. Moments in the performance it grew so quiet you heard only a single violin accompanied by four film projectors. The person responsible for the projectors did a fantastic job, it was really amazing the looping and gradual evolution. Seeing images match the music so well was doubly nice, as a band which adamantly refuses soundtrack work, it was good to see how carefully hand-picked the images were.
“Lift Your Skinny Fists to Heaven” ended up being their major reference point. As “Sleep” started up, the crowd went wild. If a 20 plus minute song could ever be a hit, this was a hit. The Coney Island speech in the beginning is fantastic as well, and works on multiple levels in New York. Sleep ended. “Rockets Fall on Rocket Falls” came up. What made me so appreciative about this track was they played the whole thing. After the initial blast, it is a fairly quiet song. The build is extremely patient. It didn’t hurt that the projectors showed off certain flair as well, with an almost unsettling focus on pure garbage (literally). Most of the films seemed to be a way of focusing your eyes off of the band members, who played in darkness. Keep in mind as you see them that they aren’t all which meets the eye. I saw a few members playing even behind the doors of perception in a little nook beyond the line of vision from the stage.
Thankfully they are going to be around doing show for the next two months. Perhaps the live setting might encourage them to re-start the project.
