The Seer (studio album)
by Swans

From LukasAntoine00s 11/21/2025 15:02 | #311770

77.73

Primer disco que escucho completo de Swans, y uno de 2 horas de duración, sorprendentemente no es su álbum más corto. La banda neoyorkina tiene LPs que duran unos minutos más, como To Be Kind o Soundtracks for the Blind. Este último era el disco que había intentado escuchar un par de veces y nunca había logrado pasar de unas tres canciones, pues no me acostumbraba a este estilo de música.

The Seer es un disco muy interesante y con demasiadas capas. Aunque difícil de digerir, no lo es tanto como Soundtracks for the Blind. El primer álbum de la trilogía, completado por To Be Kind y The Glowing Man, lanzado en 2012, lo pude escuchar en la primera reproducción, y, esta vez, más que un intento por cumplir una tarea, se trató de un gusto y apreciación por lo oscura, desconcertante e innovadora que es la música de Swans.

Debo resaltar que no me parece un género ni una banda que vaya a colocar entre mis favoritos. Ciertamente tiene un ímpetu distintivo que aleja al proyecto de Michael Gira de las convenciones generales de lo que es el rock, el rock alternativo e incluso la música ambient. Dista mucho de un Nirvana o un Brian Eno. Mi mayor obstáculo, sin embargo, no han sido las exageradas duraciones de las canciones, de las cuales, por ejemplo, The Seer me parece un enorme acierto, sino, y a opinión personal, la inconsistencia de las canciones. La muestra más clara de esto es para mí, A Piece of Sky, una canción de la que se me hacen muy difícil de escuchar sus primeros minutos, se me hace una melodía muy estruendosa y desagradable. Me recuerda a Revolution 9 de los Beatles, algo que yo no escucharía por placer... pero luego la canción se vuelve hermosa y quizá adquiere la mejor melodía que he escuchado hasta ahora de ellos. Se me hace una lástima que los primeros minutos tengan que existir para llegar a lo que viene después. Capaz que crece conmigo con el tiempo, así como la primera vez que escuché F♯ A♯ ∞ de GY!BE.

Después de The Seer, logré escuchar To Be Kind (la considerada obra maestra de Swans) y el White Light... Infinity (ese album con el artwork del conejo), y en el puntaje ponderado de las canciones, este album con portada de ¿oso? quedó en medio de ambas, siendo la de 2014 la que menos me gustó y la del conejo mi "favorita". Sin embargo, es a este proyecto al que prefiero volver para próximas ocasiones. Lo veo mucho más pulido que el álbum del bebé (no tan costoso de disfrutar) y más representativo del estilo de la banda que el álbum del conejo.

Este álbum no será para todo oyente, pero dejarlo entrar te regala un proyecto top de la banda: uno fiel al sonido que Swans ha mantenido a lo largo de su trayectoria de ya 5 décadas, un disco completo y bastante sólido. Si la banda ha lanzado un mejor disco que este, ¡aún no lo quiero descubrir!

Amazing how music can make you feel so much anxiety, in a good way

From VictorVale 09/05/2022 19:06 | #289272

Mergulho em um mundo próprio!

Every time you listen to this record it is an experience that you really have to delve into head first. With this record my favourite part about it is the lyricism which is smart and gives us a lot to dissect when you come back for multiple listens. Furthermore, this record is full of classic Swans songs which are long experimental masterpieces that thrill you with their incredible instrumentation. The two main songs that highlight this for me is Apostate and A Piece Of The Sky. Despite this, there are a few tracks on here which are quite weak and the record could definitely be trimmed down which is unusual for a Swans record to make me feel this way as it is usually the length and full on experience of their records that made me fall in love with the group. Overall, while the record does have its weak moments the majority of the album is a post-rock masterwork that is definitely near the top of their discography for quality.

From Timestarter 08/31/2020 10:55 | #257602

Fav. Tracks:

- Lunacy
- The Wolf
- The Seer
- 93 Ave. B Blues
- A Piece Of The Sky
- The Apostate

From DriftingOrpheus 06/22/2020 22:16 | #254252

In many ways, the 2010 rebirth of experimental rock giants Swans is an unflinching diagnosis of ugliness, but others would classify it as a deluge into beauty. The bands attempts to stretch allegories into long-form, punishing soundscapes was briefly traversed in 2010's My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope to the Sky. The results were fruitful and served as insidious bits of precedent for following projects. Recorded between Brooklyn and Berlin, the 11 tracks would prove to be the band's most fatalistic, foreboding statement of their collective careers. The 12th LP from the post-rock plague-harbingers was released in August of 2012, four months before the Mayans predicted Earth's curtain call. It's entitled The Seer. It sounds like the apocalypse.

The album inaugurates opening track, Lunacy, with freezing hammered dulcimer that progresses into a trio of voices chanting the song's signature. The threesome is headlined by lead vocalist Michael Gira, flanked by Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker, who make up two-thirds of the band Low. They coalesce as they incant, "Hide beneath, your monkey skin; feel his love, nurture him; kill the truth or speak the name; lunacy...lunacy...lunacy." The track then winces as the chorus declares that "your childhood is over". A pilgrimage of lost innocence is beginning to take shape. Neighboring track, Mother of the World, is a coiling, gyrating nightmare of disorientation. Quick, pummeling guitar strikes, feverish bass and calculated drums dizzy the listener for the first four and a half minutes before soothing mandolin ceases the oscillation. Gira paints visions of a Mother Earth deflowered and desecrated by humanity's ignorance. He asserts, "And where are you now, o' mother of the world; we feed from your hands and we drink from your filth and your oil." It's a distinctly provocative experience of purposive repetition. A brief moment of minimalist stillness is heard on The Wolf, which features a singing-spoken word hybrid with only acoustic guitar as accompaniment. Then, with startling immediacy, the title track appears, ushered in by wailing bagpipes. The tracks spans 32 minutes and takes many forms, paralleling the shapeshifting nature of its cognomen. Gira echoes, "I see it all," as distant kick and snare drums curiously unravel partnered with a dishonest bass groove. The malevolent pillar of a track billows before relapsing into crushing guitar collisions. The Seer then drifts into a swampy, grimy harmonica that carries a nefarious, southern hospitality. The final phase resembles the ramblings of a transient which defy articulate translation but carry an intention that is identifiably sinister. The totality of the track is truly a species unto itself.

The ever-vigilant entity recovers with the subsequent track, The Seer Returns. This experience is more traditional, if that's the word for it. Gira emits amidst a chilling choral backing (which features former Swans constituent Jarboe), "I'm down here naked, there's a hole in my chest; both my arms are broken, pointing east and west; your life pours into my mouth, my light pours out of my mouth." The return hits a euphoric plateau just before the four minute mark with the arrival of a thundering drum crash as the track whirrs into a starless sky. What follows refuses any kind of classification but it does transport the band back to their no-wave origins in New York City. 93 Ave. B Blues is a reference to Gira's 1980's big apple quarters. The area was riddled with crime and malice and it's not difficult to connect the track to its contextual inspiration. It isn't always clear what is being heard throughout the song, as the only discernible instruments are the typhoons of guitar and drums heard at the climax. It remains the flag bearer for the bands' most terrifying outing. The Daughter Brings the Water feels like a sun-soaked day at the beach in comparison. However, the track has its own misgivings detailed through its proclamations. "Stilted bones, cloaked in foam; squeeze laughter from the lather; drink water from the daughter," Gira outlines. The vague nature of the imagery leaves much to interpretation but at this point, we'd be remiss to assume a virtuous exegesis. Just when the all the light seems to have escaped, the beguiling vocals of Karen O (of Yeah Yeah Yeahs fame) ease your fears. Behind understated piano she coos, "There lies a seed of a million more just waiting to become." Gira joins in as the track wonderfully combusts with chants of "Send them home". Song for a Warrior is a thematic outlier of serene, cloudless beauty.

The final act of the menacing record commences with Avatar, decorated with orchestral bells that convey the arrival of an ominous overlord. Gira finally surfaces at the 4:40 mark, claiming that "Your light is in my hand". This may be the first allusion to "Joseph", a spiritual companion that, Gira has claimed, has spoken through him. The "avatar" in question here makes a more visible appearance on 2016's The Glowing Man. The bells intensify in the final stages of the track, melding with a kinetic guitar passage that guides the song into the past. Tenth track, A Piece of the Sky, begins with what sounds like a crackling fire mixed with a steady rainfall before giving way to a tortured cry of incorporeal beings. The piece then evolves with hammered dulcimer as anxiety begins to swirl before an atmospheric drum procession creates the illusion of climbing an ever-extending mountain. We don't hear from Gira until after the 15 minute mark as bells twinkle with a heavenly grace. What we get is most definitely the finest poetry the band has ever produced. Gira asks, "In the wind of my lung, in methane and in love, in petroleum plumes, there's a floating slice of moon; in your tooth and your claw and your unforgiving jaws; are you there?" The thematic intention echoes a ponderance of a spiritual guiding light that is visible in all things. By the end of the track, we don't know if Swans have found it but they are not without hope. The last hissing, growling transmission from The Seer is entitled The Apostate. An Apostate is someone who renounces their faith which tells us that A Piece of the Sky has not decided the issue. The Apostate is less optimistic in its outlook as its narrator alternates between belief and condemnation. Sonically, it's unrelenting, completely devoid of recognizable form and only describable as a percussive fever dream. Guitar body blows conspire with drums that sound miles away that form a sonic texture that chases you as you flee from the threat of bodily harm. The latter half of the track begins to groove with the reintroduction of the bells found on Avatar. Gira spits"get out of my mind' and "we're on a ladder to God". We never find out if they get to Heaven as the track undergoes a psychedelic breakdown capped off by a cacophony of drums not out of place at a ritualistic sacrifice.

Though many Swans historians would point to albums such as 1987's Children of God or 1996's Soundtracks for the Blind when mentioning the band's most devilish collections, debate always seems to bestow that distinction on The Seer. The album gravitates to all things chiaroscuro, both sonically and spiritually. Swans' most dystopian sound collages are unearthed here, bolstered by brilliant guest performances that further elevate Michael Gira's caliginous meditations. Such meditations could only be done justice in this particular state, elongated and agitated, forcing listeners to confront their grotesque, philosophical aberrations. Though 2014's To Be Kind possessed the best amalgamation of the band's musical and metaphorical agility, it was The Seer which prophesied Swans' staying power in the scope of modern experimental music. The record presents 11 tracks possessing a hydrous anatomy that shear with the force of 1000 serrated blades. The Seer is a direct vein pumping blood into the heart of an act that expands its importance exponentially as time progresses, while intently observing from the shadows, surrounded by a collapsing blackness.

Standout Tracks:

1. Avatar
2. A Piece of the Sky
3. The Seer

93

From LedZep 11/30/2019 11:32 | #245276

Rivals Soundtracks for the best Swans release, what an incredible album! A Piece of the Sky may be my favourite Swans song, but then again, they have too many incredible compositions to count.

Slightly weaker than To Be Kind in my opinion, The Seer acts as a precursor to the former album's skull-crushing, Neanderthal brutality, instead leaving room for some genuinely stunning lyricism (see the coda of A Piece of The Sky) and a wider timbral pallette.

From Boltzmann 09/03/2018 08:06 | #220471

Can I be totally honest with you guys? Can I not in the slightest hold back what I actually think? Will you not laugh?...
...
...This honestly sounds like The Queens of the Stone Age’s Lullabies to Paralyze with a richer instrumentation, less catchiness, and more drones. I like it though. It has the same medieval feel to it; like you’re in a hut in the woods and any day someone or something could come and take your life.

From Brad1770 02/27/2018 12:02 | #209735

I finally committed and listened to this album end to end twice , all 2 hours of it for a 4 hour commitment

And it was worth it

Highlights include the title track 'The Seer' all 30 minutes of it , ' Song for a Warrior' which includes Yeah Yeah Yeahs Karen O's beautiful vocals and album closer 'Apostate' where the drums at the 10 minute mark and at the end sound just like Fireworks

Its not perfect though , ' 93 Ave.Blues' and its industrial experimental sounds didn't work for me , neither did 'A Piece of the Sky ' or opener ' Lunacy '

I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All I See It All

SEERING

70/100