Search - Godspeed You Black Emperor :: Yanqui U.X.O.

A Grower

Scott Whistlecraft | Hampshire, UK | 06/01/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I own 3 Godspeed You! albums this one, F# A# (Infinity) and Lift Your Skinny fists Like Antennas To Heaven. On the first listens to all of them I thought they were good albums, but never truely grasped how good they were until you listen to them from start to finish. (I think that you must do this with these albums to truely appriciate them.)



With this album the main thing that I cannot decide (from the first listen to now,) is whether it has an upbeat sound or a creepy eerie tone to it.



This album unlike the other GY!BE albums is that there isn't any extracts of speeches in any of the tracks, this may sound petty but this for me was some of the reason why I went back to GY!BE, these speeches were how I remembered the individual tracks and how good they are. They set the tone for the track to come and they fit very well with the songs.



As per usual in this album this build the tracks beautifully. (I find that as soon as the drums become more aggressive you know that the band will soon follow.) But some tracks are very slow to build such as track 3 rocket falls on Rocket Falls, which is over 20 minutes long and takes a while to get anywhere.



I feel is the only down fall of this album is the length of the build-ups in the tracks half way through the album. (Espically tracks 2,3,4 althought the last quater of track 4 builds and mixes into the final track excellently)



At 72 minutes long on one disc you can feel as if it's a laboured listen but I feel that to enjoy this album you need to slug through that and re-listen to the album many times and you will be won over.



This album will never be my favourite GY!BE album. It shall be the least listened to album of theres but you must appreciate the time effort and sheer talent that this band has.



"