Godspeed You! Black Emperor is an experimental nine-piece founded in Montreal, Quebec, Canada in 1994 that specializes in semi-avant-garde instrumental music of haunting beauty. GY!BE consists of Roger Tellier-Craig (guitar), Norsola Johnson (cello), Efrim Menuck (guitar), Mauro Pezzente (bass), David Bryant (guitar), Thierry Amar (bass), Sophie Trudeau (violin), Aidan Girt (percussion), & Bruce Cawdron (percussion).
Their music should probably be described as long, dark, moody ambient. They sound a bit like an organic Tangerine Dream. Rather than using synthesizers though, they use cello, violin, upright bass, & three guitars, often adding spoken word samples. They create modern protest music in longform instrumental chamber rock compositions of immense feeling & power serving as the soundtrack to late capitalist alienation & resistance.
GY!BE has issued only two official band photos in its 30+ year existence. They have issued only a half-dozen collectively-answered written interviews over that same span. The band has never had a website or social media accounts. It has never made a video. Few rock bands in our 21st century have been as steadfast in trying to let the work speak for itself while maintaining simple rules about minimising participation in cultures of personality, exposure, access, commodification or co-optation.
This one is a text-book showing of GY!BE's ambient drone. A true behemoth...
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Peasantry or 'Light! Inside of Light! / Lambs' Breath
Asunder, Sweet / Piss Crowns are Trebled
At one with my surroundings,
NØ
Asunder
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