Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Asunder, Sweet and Other Distress (2015)

After establishing brand new, streamlined and modern sound, GYBE started writing brand new material for the first time... And they surprised everybody. "Asunder" is an album that sounds so unlike what the band had ever done up to this point, that it often falls victim to bad reviews, mainly from people that listen primarly to the first two albums. This album takes a radical approach of featuring only one, extremely long composition called "Behemoth", with... let's say very distinctive structure. It's divided into 4 tracks, but has 3 separate sections - a beginning, a dark, drawn out drone breakdown, and an ending. It's an approach that worked well on their 2000s "Yanqui UXO" track "motherfucker=redeemer",

In terms of pure sound, it's a full on continuation and doubling-down on all the stuff established on ADBA - the album is gritty, noisy and heavy. In fact, it's a bordeline "post metal" LP! Their never made any song heavier that "Behemoth" for about 10 years, since in 2024 they debuted the bleak and terrifying "Pale Spectator" suite of tracks.

The record starts with an unusual way. From the first seconds of it it's apparent that this won't be an uplifting/hopeful "John Hughes" type of song... The menacing drums that play alone for a couple of measures bring to mind an image of some gigantic beast (a behemoth?!?! ) or some kind of eldritch machine walking and talking slow but steady steps... "Peasantry" just sounds like GYBE doing doom metal. At live shows it was even better - the lonely drums section was extended heavily and often times, the "with his arms outstretched..." sample (from the beginning of "Mladic", from the previous album) was played and looped. After the droney intro section, the band plays this fantastic major key riff with an middle-eastern flavour to it, bearing inspirational similarity the furious melody of "Albanian". I love how sing-alongy it is, despite being so grandiose and almost orchestral in it's vibe. It almost songs like something Brian May would came up with in the middle of his solo. Then we had a showcase of Dave's slide guitar skills, which always surprise me with how insanely amazing it is... The drawn out slide solo goes many different places but finally settles down and dissolves into the sparse and uncompromising drone soundspace.

"Lambs' Breath" and "Asunder Sweet" sections of this LP are definitely an aquired taste. They are primary reason people bash this album a lot. On ADBA the drone tracks were at least somewhat optional, since they are seperate tracks and were put on their own, smaller vinyl. If somebody doesn't like them, they can literally just skip them. Here, it's not that simple, since they are an integral part of the entire composition, and in spite of their improvisational nature, they're still very much required for "Piss Crowns" to hit as hard as it's possible, at least in my opinion.

At live performances, the drone section was crazy. It varied significantly from show to show and featured creative sonic manipulation and interesting, dark, ambient sounndscapes. For example I really like the 2015-04-09 performance of the drone. It's a little bit short, but it features a lot of interesting sounds, like this kind of repeating/tremolo-ed static hum that sound like some broken radio signal. On studio version, the drones are admitedly not that interesting, especially the latter half of "Lambs' Breath", which in great part features just one note being played on a synth(?) with not much of anything else going on musically.

The droning transitions seamlessly into "Piss Crowns", which could be one of GYBE's best song parts ever . It recently has been brought back into the live setlists, which is the greatest thing ever! This part is one of the most cathartic pieces of music you'll ever hear, I guarantee you. The darkness slowly build into the heavenly tremolo-picked melody that tears through the wall of sound that the band ja playing and seems to just lift you upwards and then ascends into some uncomprehensible state. But that's not all, then there's this driving, triumphant outro section which is so energetic and headbangable! It speeds out and resolves in satisfying way, releasing all the tension built up through "Peasantry" and the drones.

One interesting thing about the "Piss Crowns" section is its inclusion in early 2010s' "Hope Drone" performances as a teaser of what's to come. The song was underbaked and kinda formless back then, but a lot about it was recognizeable, for example how it grows and develops from the improvised drone piece.

Overall, this is an amazing record. I like it as much as ADBA, if not maybe a little bit better, because of "Piss Crowns" alone. If it's not your cup of tea, I understand. One could say that it's been a little bit overplayed, since they performed it at virtually every 2012-2015 show and it took about 1/3 of the entire concert... Nevertheless, "Behemoth" is an unbeliveable and just very well-written composition, so if you managed to see them during that era, I envy you so much! "Asunder" is an another fantastic album by this legendary band...