Swans are the influential, experimental rock band formed in New York City in 1982 as one of the standout acts of the no wave scene. Fronted by singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Michael Gira, the group’s ever-evolving lineup and sound has helped pioneer and in many ways define aspects of noise rock, industrial music, post-punk and in later eras of the band post-rock. Its earliest records were brutal affairs of a stark beauty and unsettling intensity. By the last half of the 80s singer and keyboardist Jarboe had joined the band and its music began to increasingly incorporate a musical intricacy, melodic ambiance and emotionally nuanced delicacy that became a regular feature of the songwriting. And for years the constant members of the band were Gira, Jarboe, and longtime guitarist Norman Westberg. Swans might have come to an end on a high note following the tour for the sprawling epic of the masterful 1996 album Soundtracks For the Blind. But in 2010 Swans reconvened and began another great arc of songwriting with songs that had an even more orchestral aesthetic than in the past and a series of albums that have delved into themes of existential terror, mortality, death and the search for meaning later in life in a world seemingly on the brink of unraveling. The latest Swans record, 2023’s The Beggar, finds Gira and his collaborators manifesting some of the songwriter’s most personal statements in songs that experiment even more deeply into modes of expression that disregard conventional notions of song structure and length in favor of experiential truth.
Swans is currently on tour in support of The Beggar for its first full North American tour since 2019 (band member Kristof Hahn Is the opening act) with a stop at the Gothic Theatre in Englewood, Colorado on Tuesday November 7, 2024 (7pm doors/8pm show). We recently had a chance to interview Gira via email about the music, his interactions with the public and the works of other artists and the new album.
Tom Murphy: In your social media presence you frequently share films, other works of visual art, music and literature that you’ve been taking in that has had an impact on you. Do you find yourself drawn to particular works that you encountered earlier in your life that resonate especially strong with you now and why so?
Michael Gira: I share as little as possible about Swans and myself on our social media accounts. I only post about Swans when it’s pertinent to a new release or a tour etc. I find the medium appalling and disgusting, but I recognize it’s one of the few ways we have of letting people who are interested know when there’s something happening with the music they might like to know about. In the meantime, I post about visual artists or writers or music that I find compelling. More specifically to your question, on a personal level I often find myself returning the art of Francis Bacon, the writing of Jorge Luis Borges, and the music of Nico.
What newer artists and work have you found especially fascinating and even inspirational of late and why does it resonate with you so strongly?
The music of Maria W. Horn is fantastic and I recommend it highly, as well as her work with the singer Sara Parkman (as Funeral Folk).
As a writer of music and literature do you find encountering and absorbing the creative work of others an essential part of your process?
No. It’s enough of a struggle to make something that seems worthwhile without thinking about other people’s work.
Swans albums, especially those since reconvening, seem like quite a production. Do you approach writing and recording them in a method similar to a film director in assembling the talent and collaborators to realize them and then perform them live?
No matter how strongly I vow to keep things simple, each album inevitably burgeons into a cascade of chaos and conflicting forces and then ultimately the creative act is figuring out how to find order in the mess I’ve made for myself.
The Beggar feels like a bit of a different record for Swans. Its tensions, pastoral daydreamy sounds and spirit of unease in certain songs feels like its coming from a different place. Like a musical Ecce Homo. Were there personal insights that have come to you recently in your life that helped to shape the songs you wrote for the album?
The music and the words grow organically somewhere inside my experience and I shape them as dispassionately as I can into a form that seems compelling and irreducible. I don’t think about content much, per se, though I presume it’s there.
You have lived on both coasts of the USA and abroad but are now based out of New Mexico. Has living in The Land of Enchantment had an influence on your creative work?
Not at all, no. I’m never home anyway.
You have said that when you were finally able to work on The Beggar that it was like “he moment in The Wizard of Oz when the film changes from Black and White to Color” and now you’re feeling optimistic. What do you think accounts for what might seem like a shift in outlook for you?
I’ve realized that I feel most alive when I’m doing what I was put on earth to do, which is to make music as best I can. The period of isolation during the pandemic was a prolonged suffocation. I’m sure it was the same for many people.
The artwork for The Beggar includes images of a heart and lungs. What is the significance of that imagery for the record?
These are the internal organs that I have found to be most crucial, personally.
Perhaps you’ve discussed this elsewhere but the sleeves/CD covers for many of the current editions of Swans albums available seem to be printed on paper that looks unbleached. What about that look and texture do you think suits your music and its presentation?
I like for the work to be tactile, a palpable physical object.
Live you seem to perform longer pieces of music like “The Seer” and “Bring The Sun Toussaint L’Overture” (which is a choice historical reference). Might we see “The Beggar Love (Three)” on this tour? What is the appeal for you of performing these longer compositions on tour?
Live, the music grows and grows and grows over the course of a tour. The opening piece of our current set has now morphed into something like an hour and 20 minutes. Don’t ask me why this happens. We follow the music; it leads us. We’re inside it and it controls us, I guess would be the best way of putting it.
Queen City Sounds and Art 
You must be logged in to post a comment.