Swans

Swans, led by Michael Gira, rank among the most unyielding outfits, shifting between stark, ferocious noise-rock and somber, atmospheric folk laced with moody textures while delivering ferocious live shows. The ensemble arose from Manhattan’s downtown no wave milieu, where its abrasive performances backed abrasive, looping albums such as Filth from 1983. Greed in 1986 brought dirge-like industrial textures and a subtler atmospheric palette along with vocalist/songwriter Jarboe. White Light from the Mouth of Infinity in 1991 grew markedly more tuneful and intricately produced, though the concerts stayed visually extreme. The band dissolved in 1997 after Soundtracks for the Blind. Gira revived Swans in 2010. That lineup, equally unyielding, yielded the ensemble’s biggest commercial success, the colossal To Be Kind, in 2014. In 2017 Gira restored an alternating roster, thereafter employing a rotating cast for leaving meaning. in 2019 and The Beggar in 2023, both gentler than prior post-reunion efforts yet equally hypnotic and experimental.

Swans originated on the Lower East Side amid the peak of New York’s no wave response to punk. Guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter Michael Gira assembled the group following the breakup of his prior New York band, Circus Mort. The initial Swans lineup comprised Gira, guitarist Sue Hanel, and drummer Jonathan Kane. The trio shared bills with like-minded Sonic Youth and cut rudimentary tracks that previewed the abrasive, rhythmically battering sonics later associated with Swans; those early recordings later appeared on the Body to Body, Job to Job compilation. Another configuration featuring Kane, guitarist Bob Pezzola, and saxophonist Daniel Galli-Duani issued a self-titled EP in 1982. Personnel shifted once more for the commanding debut Filth, released in 1983 on Germany’s Zensor label and featuring Gira, Kane, guitarist Norman Westberg, bassist Harry Crosby, and percussionist/drummer Roli Mosimann.

Swans gradually attracted listeners across Europe. Kane departed after Filth, and the group—already recognized for sonic extremity and Gira’s lyrics addressing violence, extreme sex, power, rage, and the fringes of human depravity, sometimes within a single track—cultivated a domestic following with Cop in 1984. The approach remained extreme: punishing volume, molasses-slow tempos, detuned guitars, distorted electronics, and overloaded drums and percussion, yet Gira’s writing and delivery began to hint at melody. That tendency surfaced more clearly on the 1985 untitled EP containing the provocatively titled “Raping a Slave,” which became the EP’s eventual title. Constant touring brought scant U.S. popularity but steadily expanding European crowds.

Early 1986 saw the EP Time Is Money (Bastard), the full-length Greed, the album Holy Money, and the A Screw EP. Holy Money signaled a genuine sonic evolution despite similar methods. The arrival of vocalist/keyboardist Jarboe and bassist Algis Kizys subtly redirected the attack toward less physically aggressive but equally unsettling emotional terrain; both remained until the 1997 hiatus. Jarboe, present as early as Greed, functioned as Gira’s co-lead vocalist and introduced fresh dynamics and textures while matching his primal force when required.

The band signed with Caroline Records and delivered the 1987 double album Children of God, marking the decisive shift between the group’s earlier and later approaches. Gira embraced the emerging softer elements. Additional proof came via the Gira-Jarboe side project Skin (World of Skin in the United States), whose Blood, Women, Roses appeared in 1987 with Jarboe on lead vocals; the companion album Shame, Humility, Revenge, featuring Gira on lead vocals, was recorded simultaneously but released a year later. The German-only semi-official live set Real Love surfaced in 1987, followed by the 1988 Rough Trade double album Feel Good Now. Despite growing press attention and modest indie-chart placements, a cover of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart” reached the upper indie ranks in June and nearly topped them.

MCA offered and signed Swans; their first single for the label, “Saved,” sounded almost mainstream relative to the band’s origins. The Bill Laswell-produced The Burning World followed, including a luminous reading of Blind Faith’s “Can’t Find My Way Home.” Earlier recorded savagery gave way to somber, elegiac, largely acoustic writing performed as duets by Gira and Jarboe; Westberg played acoustic as often as electric guitar, Jarboe’s keyboards floated through the mix, and Kizys explored higher bass registers. Sales proved insufficient for MCA, resulting in the band’s release.

Live performances told a different story: Swans sustained violent volumes that punished listeners and occasionally featured shocking stage behavior, yet audiences expanded. Amid mounting critical resistance and an influx of new listeners, Gira created his own imprint, Young God, and spent ensuing years reissuing earlier material rather than delivering a direct sequel to The Burning World. Gira and Jarboe issued their final World of Skin album, Ten Songs for Another World, in 1990, but Swans remained silent until the 1991 release of White Light from the Mouth of Infinity. That set proved their most commercially viable yet experimentally ambitious to date, incorporating multiple textures, dynamics, and refined production; electronics augmented the instrumental palette and added depth. The ensuing tour reached the group’s largest crowds yet. Love of Life and the live album Omniscience appeared in 1992.

Jarboe released her first solo project, Beautiful People Ltd., in 1993 with keyboardist Lary Seven, revealing another facet of her multi-octave voice through neo-psychedelic pop songs. Gira concentrated on fiction, resulting in the 1995 publication of The Consumer and Other Stories by Henry Rollins’ 2.13.61 Press. Swans resurfaced with the acclaimed The Great Annihilator; Jarboe issued Sacrificial Cake and Gira released his solo album Drainland. After touring the new material, the band recorded Soundtracks for the Blind, issued by Young God in 1996. A final tour preceded Gira’s early-1997 announcement that Swans had ended; a subsequent live album was titled Swans Are Dead. Gira launched the songwriting-focused Angels of Light and continued operating Young God. Jarboe pursued a solo career, frequently working with former Swans members and collaborating with artists including Tool’s Maynard James Keenan and Jesu’s Justin Broadrick. Gira likewise kept writing and publishing fiction.

In 2009 the Young God site indicated Gira might reconvene Swans for newly written songs. Early 2010 brought the phrase “SWANS ARE NOT DEAD” on his MySpace page. The reconstituted lineup included returning and new musicians: guitarists Westberg and Christoph Hahn, drummer/percussionist Phil Puleo, drummer Thor Harris, and bassist Chris Pravdica. They recorded My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope to the Sky, released September 2010 on Young God. The live album We Rose from Your Bed with the Sun in Our Head followed in 2012, initially in a handmade limited edition with bonus tracks. August of that year brought the sprawling double album The Seer, which Gira described as thirty years in the making. After another limited release, Not Here/Not Now, the band issued the 2014 double album To Be Kind featuring guest vocals from St. Vincent and Cold Specks. The set achieved unprecedented success, earning unanimous praise and unexpectedly entering the Top 40 on both the U.S. and U.K. album charts.

Following that achievement, Gira stated the next tour and album would conclude the existing lineup’s work, after which Swans would continue with a revolving cast. After The Gate, another limited double-CD of live recordings and demos, Swans released the ambitious two-LP set The Glowing Man in 2016. Deliquescence, a limited double-CD of live performances containing three pieces absent from studio albums, appeared in 2017. Swans entered hiatus in 2018, though Gira briefly toured the West Coast with Westberg performing new material. The limited fundraiser album of acoustic demos What Is This? surfaced in early 2019, followed by the full-length leaving meaning. in late October, featuring guest musicians the Necks, Anna and Maria von Hausswolff, Ben Frost, and Baby Dee.

Unable to tour during the COVID-19 pandemic, Gira issued the solo-demos album Is There Really a Mind? to raise funds for the next Swans record. The effort succeeded, enabling the band—now comprising Angels of Light and Swans alumni plus Frost—to record at Candy Bomber Studio in Berlin. The resulting album, The Beggar, appeared in 2023 and reflected Gira’s post-pandemic outlook together with the group’s continuing experimental evolution.