Godspeed You! Black Emperor: G_d's Pee AT STATE'S END! (2021)

This release contains a 12" LP pressed on 180g vinyl and a 10" record, both at 33 1/3 RPM. The hype sticker refers to the 10" record as an EP. I'd say, after one listen, that this is phenomenal. I expected nothing less.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor: Luciferian Towers (2017)

Love this band. I have nothing negative to say about the band or this record. My photo could have been better, though.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor: Asunder, Sweet And Other Distress (2015)

After a three year break, Godspeed came back with this relatively short album, by GYBE standards.

Evidently, a double-sided poster was included with some pressings, but not mine. This record contains 4 tracks:

1. "Peasantry or 'Light! Inside of Light!'" 10:28
2. "Lambs' Breath" 9:52
3. "Asunder, Sweet" 6:13
4. "Piss Crowns Are Trebled" 13:50

I think the Allmusic critic is a big fan of GYBE:

"Opener "Peasantry or Light! Inside of Light!" thunders in on doom riffs, while squalling, sawing, multi-tracked violins and an army of slow, plodding guitars compete for dominance, with thudding drums -- à la Black Sabbath -- and a taut, layered bassline all playing variations on 12-bar blues but in waltz time. Short cadenzas are woven into the turnarounds, throwing things off and adding a regal element that passes for a schematic; it's almost florid maximalism, but the tension is palpable. After a stinging guitar break, Sophie Trudeau's violins introduce the next phase as Eastern and Western melodies join and soar to the top of the mix and the rest of the band's instruments, puncturing every space in order to catch her. That enormous crescendo we've become accustomed to never quite happens. The pace slows, the spaces get wider, and the opening riff eventually returns, this time with the pomp of those recombined harmonic lines woven in. "Lamb's Breath" and "Asunder Sweet" variously employ blown-out distorted basslines, piercing feedback, single guitar stabs, and sonic washes, culminating in tonal and microtonal drones forming the middle of the record. It's an extended meditation in sound, full of bleak and brooding dread and mournful spaces. Ambient textures from blasted organs and synths and guitar harmonics coalesce toward a squall of maqam violin themes grafted onto post-minimalist repetition. Combined, they create a ground floor for GY!BE to begin to erect their trademark urgent, dramatic tension that gradually announces the concluding "Piss Crowns Are Trebled." Single-string ringing guitar, prodded by open-tuned drones from keyboards and other six strings, whomping bass, and cataclysmic drumming are woven into and through one another as an uncharacteristically intricate violin melody climbs toward the transcendent border of no return. Everything swirls in cacophonous, ever repeating, four-beat drones; only Trudeau's violins offer variation in a frenzied, harmonic counterpoint. There is nowhere left for the music to go; even scaling back the swell of instruments doesn't succeed in relieving the tension or stop the frenetic energy; the music has entered oblivion; shelter from the storm is only unnecessary because it is impossible." [source]

I should add that I love this record. I should also add that GYBE make really fine album covers.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor: 'Allelujah! Don't Bend Ascend (2012)

It took 10 years, but the band finally put out another record. Allelujah! You can call it a comeback. The record even won the 2013 Polaris Prize. The reviews, as I recall, were good, so my faith in reviewers is partially renewed.

The band toured the year prior to this release, but I did not see them. In fact, I have never see the band in concert. Maybe I never will. I really should.

This record was sold with a bonus 7" 45RPM record, but my copy lacks the 7". I noted one other complaint on Discogs about this. How do I get my 7" record? Constellation, can you send me the 7" record?

These notes were provided on Discogs: Pressed on 180-gram virgin vinyl and comes in a tipped-on heavyweight gatefold jacket printed in full-color process plus a spot metallic ink and spot matte varnish. LP dust sleeve is also 4-color print, with a center hole cut to display the record label on either side. Package includes a 7" in printed dust sleeve and a 12" x 48" poster (printed full-color on both sides) featuring a collage of film stills specially-photographed and captured from the GY!BE live 16mm projections. Godspeed You! Black Emperor is also credited as "God's Pee" on the back cover, spine, and dust sleeve.

Once again, Allmusic praised the record, and rightly so, because it is great, even though I don't have the 7" record that is supposed to come with it.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor: Yanqui U.X.O. (2002)

Godspeed You Black Emperor! became Godspeed You! Black Emperor on this release. I suppose it's a subtle difference. The good news is that discogs hasn't made two entries for the band, something that is entirely possible on that site, but would be dumb.

GYBE gets right to the point on the insert:

"09-15-00 is sept.15,2000 is Ariel Sharon surrounded by 1,000 Israeli soldiers marching in Al-Haram Ash-Sharif & provoking another intifada."

That's a political statement. In fact, there's lot of political references on this record, even if there are few spoken word parts. Let's start with the title. U.X.O. refers to unexploded ordinance, which is exactly what it sounds like: any type of munition that did not explode after deployment and, therefore, still poses a risk. Lots of unexploded WWII bombs have been found in London and other places. In the album footnotes, Godspeed defines U.X.O. as "unexploded ordnance is landmines is cluster bombs."

What's interesting about the album jacket is that the rear cover shows a diagram that suggests that BMG, AOL Time-Warner, Vivendi Universal, and Sony all have links to manufacturers of armaments and, by extension, American U.X.O.

And then there's this:

"Though godspeed is guilty of profiting from hateful chainstore sales, we encourage you to avoid giving money to predatory retailers and superstores. & hope still, a little resistance always maybe, stubborn tiny lights vs. clustering darkness forever ok? thankslovegodspeed
you!blackemperorgoodbyexoxoxoxoxox"

There are some differences between the vinyl and CD pressing, as explicated by a detail-oriented Wikipedia editor:

"The album was released as a CD and a double vinyl LP, the latter having three noticeable differences. One is the compounding of the two-part composition "09-15-00" (the album liner notes imply that on this date the second Palestinian intifada began, although this is incorrect) into one. Another is the addition of an untitled "hidden" track after some silence (it is masked in a similar manner with the short song "J.L.H. Outro" on the CD release of F♯A♯∞); this ulterior track consists of a sampled and cut-up George W. Bush speech with applause added (it also appears on bandmember Aidan Girt's related project 1-Speed Bike's debut album Droopy Butt Begone! (2000) in the track "The Day that Mauro Ran Over Elwy Yost", as well as on Museum Fire Records' compilation Azadi! (2003, a benefit for the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan) where it is titled "George Bush Cut Up While Talking"). Finally, the second section of the two-part track "Motherfucker=Redeemer" is about five minutes longer on the LP due to an extended ambient opening." [source]

Somewhat bizarrely, the Allmusic reviewer refers to the band as "Montreal politico-art/music terrorist unit." I am not sure what a music terrorist is, but it is somewhat surprising that the reviewer would have used those words so soon after 9/11. Nevertheless, the review is positive and the review concludes with this statement: "And for the record, though the critical backlash against Godspeed You! Black Emperor has already begun, this is music for a different kind of engagement; one that sets its own agenda and pushes against its own history." [source]

Even some friends became inexplicably anti-GYBE, based solely on the assessment that the band relied on a formula of soft followed by crescendo. I would call that a totally simplistic view of the band and its sound. Allmusic has a much better description of the music, noting that it "develops slowly over time and creates layers of dynamic tension that expresses itself in waves and off-kilter, shimmering flows." [source]