There’s one hell of lot to recommend this album. For starters, it features Eugene S. Robinson of Oxbow in collaboration with Anthony Saggers (Stray Ghost, White Lace and Tender Prey). The press release suggests that ‘Chalk White Nights’ really could be the soundtrack to a walk through a William Burroughs novel. Or Robinson's recently published noir tome, 'A Long Slow Screw'. I’m already jizzing in my pants and I’ve not even finished downloading my digital promo. Maybe the title of Robinson’s book is a SWANS reference, and maybe it isn’t, but given Robinson’s background it’s quite likely.
When I say this release is fucked up, I mean it as high praise indeed. Cracked and worn, the music is sparsely arranged yet dark, dense and oppressive, and slithers along, clawing the dust on the scorched ground. Robinson’s vocals are cracked and desperate, the pained sound of a man in ruins. Strung out and wasted, ‘The Night of No Sleep’ sounds more like the month of no sleep, while the nine-minute ‘Beautiful Boy With a Stone’ creeps and crawls about . The slow burn of ‘The Organist’ sees the vocals all but lost beneath an epic drone before a piano builds the drama that forms the fabric of the desolate narrative. The mad primal scream of ‘A Black Cat’ is chilling, and there isn’t a moment of this album that allows the listener to sit back and settle. Tense and uncomfortable, albums don’t come much more compelling than this.
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