Album of the Year: Swans – To Be Kind

We have been told for years by the media, the record industry and “taste-makers” everywhere that popular music is resolutely a young person’s game. Carefree youth is what it’s all about and any sign of ageing, maturity or artistry and most musicians will be shown the door and put out to pasture unless they are revisiting past glories.

In 2014, Swans put paid to this myth by releasing To Be Kind, the most impressive album of their 32 year (on-off) existence under the direction of Michael Gira – the band’s 60-year-old vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and band leader.

To Be Kind is a feral blues masterpiece that is almost symphonic in its scope. There are echoes of other leftfield avatars, like Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd, the Velvet Underground and the Birthday Party. The ghost of the great Howlin’ Wolf even makes itself known in the menacing and intense “Just a Little Boy”. But these are merely textures which illuminate a highly singular and powerful album. To Be Kind is most definitely the work of a group of unique artists and not of fanboys who are content to take their cues from others.

As with anything this monumental, To Be Kind is probably not for everyone. However, from the brooding “Screen Shot” to the cacophonous “To Be Kind” via the howling vocals and demonic chanting of “A Little God in My Hands” and the half-hour long journey into the heart of darkness that is “Bring the Sun/Toussaint L’Ouverture”, the album emphatically offers over two hours of powerful, filler-free, primal grooves that shake the soul.

The past year hasn’t just been about loud and throbbing trance rock though. Other highlights have included the druggy romanticism of the Flies’ Pleasure Yourself and Neneh Cherry’s collaboration with RocketNumberNine, Blank Project. Lana Del Rey showed that Born to Die was no flash in the pan with the laid-back yet unsettling Ultraviolence, while Tinariwen’s desert-trance masterpiece Emmaar suggested that their dominance of the World Music scene isn’t over yet. Debut of the year, however, came in the guise of Texan party people Purple’s high-energy garage punk set, (409). Nevertheless, 2014 belonged to Swans.