What, you mean you haven't had your fill of post-post-rock orchestras?
The Swords Project sure hope you haven't, and if you still have room
on your shelf for them, they will eagerly nestle themselves into your
collection.
The seven-member group from Portland, Oregon's debut EP includes
four epic songs for a total of 28 minutes. However, this is an accessible,
digestible type of epic-ness, not the apocalyptic, grand pageantry type
of epic-ness. Each song gets to the point--the emotion of the
song--fairly directly.
"Shannon's Wedding Song" is a graceful, pretty song that sounds more
like chamber music than rock and roll, bringing to mind groups like
Rachel's and The Sonora Pine. The first part of the song relies on
interplay between the guitarist and the keyboardist, the guitar playing
a sparse sweeping progression as the keyboards twinkle in the spaces
in-between the guitar's notes. Eventually the violin becomes the lead
instrument, playing a progression much like the guitar did earlier,
leading the orchestra into a fuller, grander section--prototypical
Godspeed You Black Emperor! but done beautifully and much more
delicately, as is suitable for the title's locale.
The other three songs on the EP fit less neatly into the "chamber music"
pigeonhole as all three feature pleasant male vocals (low in the mix)
and more rock-style songwriting, based less on interaction between the
strings and more on creating interesting or beautiful riffs and sounds.
"The New Assassin" has a menacing sound and is interestingly constructed,
with many layers, basically using the strings (violin, guitar) as the
rhythm section with the piano carrying the melody of the song. The song
builds into a section of louder drums, raygun explosion effects, and a
high-pitched guitar. "Squatting Level" starts off almost like a pop
song, with a slow organ melody and soft, plaintive vocals, the bass
coming in to provide a short, simple hook. The song builds into a very
rich, loud, textured section of cacophonous sounds, which seem to express
the singer's desire better than the words in the pop section of the
song did. The final song, "Case Study in Pathetics," is reminiscent
of another Portland (and other hometowns) group, Rollerball, as the
vocals lead the build in volume to a short rolling section built from
a violin riff. This section decays into an incidental patchwork of
notes from all the players, giving the song a lonely, isolated feel.
The Swords Project definitely sounds like several other bands.
However, whatever horse-lengths The Swords Project lose for not being
the first ones out of the gate, they quickly gain back for directness
and emotional scope.
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