SWANS — Filth (review)

SWANS — Filth album cover Album · 1983 · Metal Related Buy this album from MMA partners
3/5 ·
Warthur
With Jonathan Kane and Roli Mosimann's duelling percussion creating the impression of an angry heroin-addicted trash can stomping down the street intent on mugging you, the Swans' debut album is as pure and uncompromising an expression of their early No Wave sound as you could expect to find.

Though subsequent releases like Cop can become introverted and impenetrable, the sound of Filth hooks you instantly with its raw ugliness; far from being indirect or oblique, it comes at you straight and true and confronts you with a hideous musical vision. The flipside of that is that it's not necessarily a musical vision you would want to spend much time with - it's a statement of intent that is so clear, pure, and simple, that it feels less like nine ways to make more or less the same point.

Whilst heavier albums in terms of sheer downtuned riffage have emerged over the years, few releases have ever felt so misanthropic and violent. I am fairly sure nobody was bloodily beaten to death during the recording of this album, but if they were I'm not sure it would change the sound appreciably. Whether this is necessarily something you want to revisit regularly is another question.
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