Swans - Filth / Body to Body, Job to Job (2CD)

Collects the debut SWANS LP Filth (1983) and the 1982-1985 rare material compilation album Body to Body, Job to Job (1991).

This is all slabs of sound, rhythm and screaming/testifying. What more do you need? In a way, it was a reaction against Punk (and just about any other music you can think of), and the conservative notion that 3 chords were somehow necessary. I used to deny it vehemently at the time, but No Wave (I "hated" that scene too, for some reason I can't remember now) played a big role as the germ from which this music grew, along with The Stooges and Throbbing Gristle, of course. I wanted Swans to be "heavier" though - I wanted the music to obliterate - why, I don't remember! I think it just felt good. Live, we used two basses (playing utterly unmusical chords that were stabbed and left to sustain or sometimes hit in staccato or opposing rhythms), drums, a "percussionist" that slammed down on a metal table with a metal strap, crude cassette loops of various sounds/noises (usually some kind of undefined ROAR), and Norman Westberg's glorious sustained and screaming guitar chords. It was pretty elating to play live - for us. If 100 people showed up (which would have been a huge audience at the time - 20 was more the average), 80 were guaranteed to leave by the second song. Somehow that tension - contempt or indifference from the audience - was nourishing, so we kept going.