Only Five Dollars...



from thewire.co.uk/articles/1223

The Stone thestonenyc.com

MICHAEL GIRA SOLO TOUR

Europe | OCTOBER 2007

11/10/07 : AB-club - Brussel (B) (support Marissa Nadler)
12/10/07 : STUK - Leuven (B)
13/10/07 : Theater Kikker - Utrecht (NL)
14/10/07 : Vera - Groningen (NL)
15/10/07 : Paradiso - Amsterdam (NL)
16/10/07 : PTR - L'usine - Geneva (CH)
17/10/07 : Circolo degli Artisti - Roma (I)
19/10/07 : KC Belgie - Hasselt (B) (+ Boredoms)
20/10/07 : Sonic City festival - Kortrijk (B) (+ Boredoms / Deerhoof /....)
21/10/07 : Taylor John's House - Coventry (UK)
22/10/07 : Academy - Manchester (UK) (+ Boredoms)
23/10/07 : Arches - Glasgow (UK) (+ Boredoms)
24/10/07 : The Lemon Tree - Aberdeen (UK) (+ Boredoms)
26/10/07 : The Wire/Electra festival (Shoreditch Town Hall) - London (UK) (+
Boredoms)
27/10/07 : Monto Water Rats - London (UK)

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
M.Gira / Angels of Light

Raw text interview for Sentireascoltare italian mag

July 07



> • When I saw the cover of We Are Him I smiled, because the Deryk
> Thomas artwork is unmistakable. In 1994 you wrote: "All that was left was a
> voice, the voice of Deryk Thomas, and it pounded in my head like a scream
> trying to escape, and it told me this: 'You will use my paintings to
> illustrate your silly and miserable songs, so that the listener might dream
> of finer things-of Turner, Poe, Bacon, and Blake - as he is subjected to the
> running sore of your entropic, suppurating music, a music like bad breath
> even when it's 'pretty''. It is a lot of time that your music it's not
> illustrated by an artwork made by Deryk Thomas. Has the Thomas voice
> resounded again in your head? And why now?


Oh it's no big deal. I was just talking to him on the phone and he mentioned
he had some new paintings. I looked at them and they were perfect for the
music, in that they don't relate at all to the music, they have nothing to
do with it, but that difference makes a nice friction, or like when you put
the positive and negative ends of two magnets against each other...
>
> • Musically speaking, this is, in my opinion, the richest work of the
> Angels of Light. It's full of details, sounds, words, guests. It seems that
> you've tried to move away from the latest albums with Akron / Family to
> centre your music again around you. What was wrong with the first recording
> session?

Thank you. I spent a year working on the album and it contains my DNA, or
the DNA of the person who really wrote and sang the album. His name is
Joseph. He lives just behind my head. He is an emissary of God, but he is
also up to no good sometimes. Anyway, I am thankful that he visits me. If he
didn't, I would be someone like Paris Hilton, or a successful lawyer, or
maybe - probably would have been the best outcome - a skilled carpenter...

There was nothing wrong with the first recordings for the album. Akron did
their job very well. They are like masons, or metal workers. In this case
they built a bed frame and placed a mattress on it. Everyone else had an
orgy on it. What you hear in the end is the visual pattern of the sex stains
on the raw mattress.




>
> • We Are Him has a very physical approach. Your voice fills the spaces
> even in the more quiet passages. How still important is that the music
> physically vibrate in the viscera as you have always tried to do with the
> Swans? You know… Black River Song, My Brother's Man and We Are Him are so
> tipically yours!

Well I disagree that Swans was always visceral. Swans sounded like many
things at different times. But yes, there are some heavier songs on this
record. The songs were written on acoustic guitar though, so I'm sure in
some way they are still weak and silly, even if they sound "powerful". I am
an utter sham, but I manage to fool even myself... I am thinking of making a
very "heavy" record for the next angels of light album, even heavier than
swans ever were. We'll see. I just might record instead with a hammer
dulcimer and voice. Who knows? It's Joseph's business, not mine....

>
> • Who is Mary Lou? A sarcastic comment to the Ricky Nelson song?

Oh no, I don't like sarcasm in music, I would never do that. Mary Lou is a
fictional composite of many past girl friends. I want them all to "rise up
through the blue" - to heaven - so they can look down upon me and continue
to torture me endlessly, forever and ever. My ideal woman: im am an insect,
and she holds me in her tweezers beneath a magnifying glass, guiding a
concentrated dot of the sun onto my soft underbelly...You can never leave
your past behind.
>
> • I've read an old interview with you, where you said that the
> artistic ways of Swans and Sonic Youth could have been similar, but while
> Thurston Moore was skilled in establishing relationships and friendships you
> instead were able only to make enemies. The great number of guests on the
> new album seems to contradict you. You've become a very respectable musical
> patron with the Young God. How do you live in this role so drastically
> different from the one you seems to had in the Swans?

Oh I'm a completely different person now in many ways. I suppose the
ruined/angry/vengeful child still lives in me, but I've covered him in honey
and stuck rose petals to his skin. Now, when he screams, a pure note of
shimmering joy comes out, instead of a sound like a pit bull being
strangled...also, I don't really care about myself anymore - "I" can go to
hell, as far as I'm concerned. I live outside myself. I feel like a saint. I
want to help other people learn how to lose themselves, disappear, which is
what we should all be aiming for.... Many of the artists on my label call me
"Uncle Mike" - ha ha!




>
> • It seems that you're going to make an appearance on the new Xiu Xiu
> album and that among others, there will be future releases on Young God by
> two outstanding voices such as Larkin Grimm and Josephine Foster. What can
> you say me about? Have you listened the recent collaboration between
> Josephine Foster and the Cherry Blossoms? Fantastic.

Jamie from xiu xiu is a really talented young man. Also, he takes risks, so
I like him. I sing the utterly preposterous song "under pressure" with him.
I don't really care if I look ridiculous now. In fact I AM ridiculous, so no
matter... Larkin and I have been in correspondence for a few years, finally
the circumstances are right for her to release music on YGR. We'll be
recording her album in January. She's quite insane, but in a nice way! The
proposed album of Josephine for YGR didn't work out. I haven't heard the
music by her w/cherry blossoms that you mention...

>
> • You don't know it, but the fact that you have distributed new music
> by Lisa Germano with Young God has been the best gift you could do to
> myself. I have already asked to her when she heard for the first time about
> you, now I ask to you the contrary. How you ran for the first time into her
> music and what has attracted you?

I absolutely love Lisa. My Viking hippie friend Thor, who played in her band
for a while, first brought the album "Geek, The Girl" to my attention, and I
was immediately hypnotized by the spells she casts. She is quite magical...
Later, as YGR became a viable label, I of course approached her about
releasing her music, but it took many years until she finally agreed to
release something. In the Maybe World was the first release, then I was
overjoyed to be able to release the 2xCD reissue of Lullaby For Liquid Pig,
which is to me one of the most painful and sweet sonic places you could
escape into of all time...



>
> • Beyond the phenomenon of pre-war folk grown mainly around Devendra,
> Vetiver and CocoRosie, and considering examples similar to you, (from a band
> much loud like the early Swans you have progressively concentrate on the
> acoustic sound) examples like Steve Von Till and Daniel Higgs solo things,
> it seems there is a general return to the roots, to the American classical
> sound. Is the American music really all contained into the Harry Smith
> Anthology? To being reactionary seems now a way to be "avant" . What do you
> think about this?

I don't think much about it. I just like human music. I also like music that
is a physical struggle to make, that requires physical and mental
concentration to make a sound. In Swans, for instance, in the early days,
volume and amplification was very important, but to make the music was an
act of physical will - it was actually very disciplined. but after a while I
realized that the volume was not necessarily the only way to get something
into the center of your chest. I realized recently that when I play live
shows now with just my acoustic guitar and voice, that it's actually very
similar to the early days of Swans. It creates a similar place.... Oh, I
don't really care about "the american classical sound" you mention. I mean,
I enjoy that music, but I like anything that goes directly to the center of
your skull when you listen. I like tibetan ritual music and james brown
equally.

>
> • In an old song by the Swans, God Loves America, you were singing:
> "So God Forgive America
> The End Of History Is Now
> And God May Save The Victim
> But Only The Murderer Holds Real Power"
> The Swans were political polemic, sarcastic and irreverent. I think that
> lines were such prophetic. Now how do you place yourself with the current
> political situation in the U.S.A.?

The sentiment of that song is something I still feel, but I think those
lyrics are simply awful, trite, heavy-handed and obvious. And the singing?
Good god! How ham-fisted can you get??? I don't know who the hell I thought
I was, but I'm glad I'm not that person any more...as for politics, I don't
know, it's strange that I still retain this, but my father always taught me
that it's not good manners to criticize one's country when in a foreign
country, so since this is not an american interview I won't mention my
politics. I presume you can infer what my politics are anyway, and my
personal political opinions will change nothing at all, so it doesn't
matter...

>
> • I've seen an old videoclip, which was done for A Screw. I don't know
> who has directed it but according to me it represents perfectly what were
> the Swans before Children Of God. A physical sound, on the physique, with
> the physique. Corporeal. I remember also the Rotting Pig story from your
> collection of tales, where you describe a strange cosmic situation around a
> body and its sensorial perceptions. The body seems to be a fundamental
> subject for you. What is it exactly for you?

I directed that video. It was made in a small room with one camera and some
crude editing gear. It took a week of work, 16 hours a day, and at the end,
because I was drinking endless beer and smoking and drinking coffee at the
same time, I had what I thought was a heart attack, and the ambulance came
and took me to the hospital. Turns out it was a "panic attack" - my first -
ha ha ha! Anyway, that video was the only good video swans ever did, I
think. Now, I hate the whole notion of rock videos. What a bunch of shit!
Oh, sorry, you asked about "the body" - I don't know, I don't think about
that very much. I also wish that I had never published any of my stories. A
person's worst tendencies, revealed in public - always a bad idea!
>
> • I know that you are not particularly satisfied with your Love Will
> Tear Us Apart version, in fact you chose the Jarboe version for Various
> Failures, but your way of singing has very much in common with that of
> Curtis. Recently at the Cannes film festival has been projected Control the
> bio film about his life. What do you think of him and if it is the case how
> much he has influenced you?


I liked joy division all right I guess, sure, but not really more than other
music I was listening to at the time. I thoroughly regret doing that cover
version. What a terrible, terrible mistake it all was. The singing is awful,
the production is wimpy, the original is a thousand times better. What a
waste! When I first thought of doing it, I wanted it to sound like a
christmas song, like "little Drummer Boy" - lots of children singing, a vast
phil spector-ish sound. Would have been nice. But instead it turned out
sounding like inept bubble gum music. Oh well...
>
> • Simon Reynolds in his recent book about post-punk include the Swans
> in the second industrial generation, together with Einsturzende Neubauten,
> Cabaret Voltaire, Test Dept, Coil and Foetus. I know that you hate to be
> labelled as industrial and I know that your first influences were mainly
> punk. Did you not like the industrial English groups led by the Throbbing
> Gristle? How and why did you decide to use tape loops and the drum machine
> for the Swans music?

Oh I loved Throbbing Gristle. I knew about Genesis and his escapades way
back when, through Coum Transmissions. Throbbing gristle was a huge
inspiration to me. Of course I didn't want to make music like them at all,
but the primitivism of it, the use of sounds - musical and non-musical - as
setting up a ritual environment - all very expressionistic. I also liked
their insistence on content, and the provocative subject matter, the way it
picked at the scabs of your consciousness. I also like their "pop" songs
though, like the song "United" etc... Anyway, the notion of "industrial"
music doesn't interest me though. It didn't then and it doesn't now...

>
> • You have played music with Glenn Branca. What has remained of that
> experience and what memories do you have?


I'm left with a sense of flying, of time travel, of levitation...
>
> • I have listened again to the World Of Skin music. Again with great
> pleasure. It was a great project. I love the contrast between the Jarboe
> voice and yours. You worked really as a couple, mainly in those Skin songs.
> Angels of Light is above all a project of yours, centred on your voice. Do
> you not think that working again with a female voice would be a great thing?

I actually can't listen to that music. Just my personal taste I suppose. At
the time, I presume my intentions were earnest - maybe too earnest - but now
it just seems pretentious and overwrought... Sad...

>
> • Many years have passed and both of you have well distinguished and
> recognizable musical projects, but you think that is still possible that you
> and Jarboe go back to make music together once more?

No, I'm not interested in doing that, thanks for asking...
>
> • In the last Swans album Soundtrack for the blind and the project of
> Body Lovers, you have approached to the modern classical music and film
> music, in particular the Ligeti sound. Do you think that is still possible
> for you to make music with this type of sounds?

I've lost interest in that way of making music. I'm interested in trying to
write good songs now, that simple. It's a huge challenge, the biggest
challenge of my life. That's enough...
>
> • Recently David Lynch used music by Ligeti, the same used by Kubrick
> in The Shining, for his last movie, Inland Empire. In Mulholland Drive there
> is a strange ghost evil character, called "The Cowboy". He has always made
> me think of you. Even the actor looks like you. Do you like Lynch and his
> imaginary?

Sometimes I like him. I like the sexy bits best. I don't care much for his
random surrealism these days. Elephant Man, Eraserhead, Blue Velvet, and The
Straight Story are my favorites of his work, especially Eraserhead, though I
admire, for purely salacious reasons, the lesbian scene in Mullholland
Drive...
>
> • Once you have offered your right pinkie for $250.000. Did you
> receive many offers? Hope that you don't need to do it anymore! :)


You know, it would be a great benefit to my own and my family's future, so
I'd probably still do it... Who needs their right pinkie anyway?

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

M.Gira / Angels of Light

Raw text interview for Rockerilla magazine (italy)

July 07

1. In the transition from Swans to Angles of Lights, what did change in
your poetry and music? Did your lyrics keep on having such a strong 'dark
and pessimistic side' they used to?

I hardly know how to answer that. "dark and pessimistic"???? - that's
certainly not me now, and never has been really. I've always wanted the
effect of my music, whatever means it used, to be joy and release and true
happiness. I struggle to be a decent person, like most people. I want to
live in the center of the sun, to burn alive, my molecules to dissipate into
the universe. The best hope for us all is to disappear, to erase ourselves,
and in doing so find the truth. Life is change. I don't resemble the person
I once was, inside or out, but the breath of god holds the "me" inside the
random, changing shape of my body. God is in me. I am god.

1. Tell me what do you think about the whole pre-war folk movement grew
up in the USA indie scene during the last decade. Do you feel, somehow,
involve in such a musical stream?

It's good that young people are trying to make music that has genuine
feeling and simple power again. I could very easily live without the flowers
and body lice however. Still, the holy ghost is emerging again, spreading
light in the grey dusk of the concrete and steel forest, sending clear blood
through the optic wires and invisible radio waves, thrusting a sharp silver
knife into the center of the collective skull. The children will rise, and
eat the sky.



2. What kind of music do you listen to nowadays? Old stuff? New one?

I listen to Neal Young, Nina Simone, Fela Kuti, Tibetan Ritual Music, and
Throbbing Gristle exclusively.


3. Let's focus on the song 'Promise of Water'. I'd rather say that those
lyrics are pretty cryptic...a sort of prophecy is hidden in them. Is that
correct?

This song is a product of, and also "about" mind control. It's the result
of realizing that now very little exists outside the hallucinated world of
the media. The physical world is disappearing, and as it does so it is
eating itself, writhing in the last throes of violence and destruction,
erupting in an orgy of slaughter and bestiality, pollution and utter
corruption. It is a cleansing. We are creating heaven on earth.


4. 'Sunflower's here to stay' seems to show pretty well the light/hopeful
side of your art. The music is rather 'sunny' as well. Would you tell me
something about this one song?

It is an homage to the bearded He/She Devil that is leading the children
towards paradise. He wears the raw and bloody skin of freshly killed
animals. He drinks wine until his belly bloats. He belches lightning. He
brings us a new, cruel and beautiful world. It's up to us to follow him, and
follow him we must! It is a happy place he leads us towards... We must go
there, and go there soon...

5. How's working with the whole Akron/Family as backing band?

They are young men. They are strong. Their hands are agile, but dirty. They
dig in the dirt, they unearth the past. The hold the skulls of their
ancestors up to the sky and they wail and shout songs of praise for the past
and the future. Their music shatters the false dome of the sky, opening up a
fissure there so God can look down upon us once again. Their instruments
grow from their bellies, one with their bodies. If you place your ear
against their chest, you will hear the songs of the Buddha, but though they
are ignorant of this fact, you will also hear the vengeful scream of Shiva.
They are vessels. They are puppets of God, a simple rock band after all.


6. What about the arrangements of your songs? How do you work to fit them
perfectly to your compositions?

I am an idiot. I write a song, then I sit there dumbfounded and quivering.
This quivering attracts flies. My friends are beneficent flies, in a way.
They take the song and devour it, chew at it, excrete upon it. I protest, in
pain, since the song is actually my body. I am being eaten alive by my
friends and collaborators. Together, we make beautiful music.



7. Body, work, sex, childhood, parents and God. Those are some of the
sources of your original poetry. How did they match together, all through
years, into a whole one peculiar vision of life and music?

The source of my writing (not "poetry"!!!) has always been love. Love flows
through me. It is beyond my control. I have nothing to say personally.
Someone else is speaking through me. At the best moments, "I" completely
cease to exist. The snap of sound, the cracking of the air as I disappear,
is the sound of the music I make.

8. Tell me something about your favorite writers ever. The ones you got
inspired from the most.

I am never really "inspired" by writers, in the sense that they might make
me want to do something similar to what they do. I don't place much belief
in the "truth" of fiction, either... My favorite "writers" would have to be
Walt Disney (from the '50's, not now), Robert Crumb - especially the Weirdo
comics, any competent advertising copy writer, and I also admire the work of
the great american author Cormac McCarthy.


9. I'd like to know more about the opener of Angles of Light brand new
cd: "Black River Song". Does repetition have a great deal in your way of
performing music?

There's always change in repetition, no matter what, no matter how tiny the
change. LaMonte Young's famous Dream House has a room with a constant drone
( a combination of several notes, I think) that is unvarying. However, as
you shift your body around the space, the tone and ambience changes
completely. It's quite revelatory, very beautiful. But that has nothing to
do with my song, Black River Song. The groove of that song is inspired by
Muddy Waters' song Mannish Boy. I saw the film The Last Waltz recently, and
his performance is amazing, even though he's quite old. He is an animal, a
priest, a Shaman, a Voodoo God, a Baptist preacher, the living God, and he
makes all the other performers in the movie look like weak and flimsy
children.


xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Angels of Light / M. Gira

Raw interview text for Ritual Magazine (Italy)

july 07


In terms of immediacy, 'We Are Him' sounds more direct and also more
"catchy" than the previous AOL albums, especially for the vocal harmonies.
Was it intentional?

No, nothing is intentional in my music. It is all random. I have no control
over it. I may think I do have control, but that's an illusion I choose to
embrace to save myself the embarrassment of admitting to myself that I'm
worthless. My music is not made by me! I have little to do with it. An
unseen force takes over, and this force sculpts not only the sound, but also
the thoughts inside my head. I am helpless - a shivering infant. A strange
being takes me into his arms, kisses the top of my head, and breathes
consciousness into my otherwise empty mind. Again, I have no control over
it. I'm like a zombie, animated by the consciousness of an invisible shaman.
He lives in a shack in my back yard. He eats dog food, worms, and
dandelions. What a strange guy!

Nowadays you play with Akron Family as your backing band: so, I wonder if
and how much they influenced your approach to the songwriting…

My songs are always written on acoustic guitar, finished before I work with
other people. I sing them to my wall. I know they're good when they cease to
bounce back at me, when the wall swallows them. Akron/family are members of
a obscure sect that live in the mountains in Pennsylvania. They sent me
unsettling letters, followed me, and whispered just out of earshot things I
didn't want to hear. Eventually I did hear them though, and these weird
thoughts entered my mind, against my will. Now, they have taken over my
life completely, so much so that I don't know where they begin and I end.
You could even say this new record is an akron/family record - they have
that much power over me. I am begging for someone to please peel them away
from my skin, but I love these boys too much - I want to be with them
forever. They give me meaning, the only meaning I have ever known, and a
small measure of truth - the tiny amount they allow me to experience, that
is. Otherwise they keep the truth to themselves, the secrets of the
universe.


However, the new songs go immediately straight to the heart of your fans,
because they play in the usual AOL mood (and also with the usually wonderful
work made by Cristoph Hahn's guitar), but even with something that reminds
me as well of Swans' 'Love Of Life' / 'White Light' era. Could you see it as
a possible connection?

Oh, Christoph Hahn, my hero! I once saw him do 100 push ups right before a
concert, smoking a cigarette while he did it, his shirt off and sweat
pooling together in the small of his back. Furtively, I took a hypodermic
needle and unbeknownst to him as he exercised, I sucked up the sweet nectar
his body excreted right into my syringe - then, I injected this clear liquid
into my veins. What a rush! What colors!!!!!! My resulting performance,
minutes later, was the best of my life. I virtually levitated, like a
Tibetan monk leaping over the mountains. Christoph is the descendant of
ancient, ancient Germanic tribes. He plays guitar like a Negro, but he is
Aryan deep in his blood. He lives in Berlin, where he is a professor of
philosophy, his specialty being the study of the peculiar ontology of micro
cephalic peoples, especially those unfortunates that were swept up in the
Diaspora of Cretins across the Russian Steppes. So, yes! There is definitely
a connection between this record and white light etc - thanks so much for
noticing!

The 'We Are Him' peculiarities that I'd mostly admire are the energy itself
of the melodies and the great production of the arrangments: I guess that
the helping hands of Bill Rieflin and Eszter Baliant gave an important
addition to the structure of the songs. What can you tell me about these two
collaborators?

Thanks so much, I'm very happy to hear you enjoy the music! It was a huge
endeavor, making this record. It reminded me of my days as a construction
worker, carrying 90 pound sacks of cement up a ladder all day in the hot
sun. Day in, day out. Like going to the factory to make plastic bags too,
really. It was relentless. Bill Rieflin, my dear old friend, came to the
rescue though. He arrived with his usual bag of tricks - a razor blade, a
bible, a pair of scissors, and an ample supply of shaving cream. None of
these instruments worked however, so instead he played bass guitar, drums,
organ, synthesizer, that kind of thing. As usual, I just said to him, "do
what you want bill. I'm going to the bar to drink. Gimme a call when you're
finished." and that's what happened. First, the song was a piece of shit,
suppurating in the hot sun of mediocrity, then Bill arrived - my savior -
and suddenly it had life, like an old dry mackerel in the sand, instantly
transformed into a dragonfly, darting up at your face, taking a bite out of
your ear as it leapt up to heaven... What a MENSCH Bill is! ...with Eszter
it was the same way, but different. She is an extremely beautiful woman, so
when she arrives in the studio, everyone gets nervous and self conscious.
Not only is she beautiful, but she is also a musical genius, and her SOUL is
as generous as the Mother Mary. This helps to bring calm to the studio, just
a second later. And her fiddle playing is beyond description - it's like
1000 bluebirds singing in the forest, all at once, all singing the exact
same note. It really lifts you up to heaven, for god's sake... Anyway, as I
say, my songs and music are deeply beneath contempt, but with friends such
as these, I am able to propagate the scam that I actually have something to
say, and even get away with it...

Why did you prefer such an extreme instrumental line up change for the
Angels of Light live? And how do you think it positively affected the music?

The studio and live performances have nothing to do with each other, or very
little. I now prefer, even though I've made my most elaborately orchestrated
record in years, to play solo live, with just my acoustic guitar and voice.
But my voice is huge, like a dank wet blanket smothering the huddled crowd.
It's one of my favorite things to do, to suck the life out of a room, draw
it deep into my lungs, then exhale it again in a song that sprays from my
mouth like a fire hose of cheap perfume.


There are a lot of huge collaborators in the album, among them I'd like to
rmember Larkin Grimm, one of the most exciting experience of the american
avant-folk. I notice that, nowadays, there's an increasing interest for the
so called free-folk, and for the "roots music" with acid and psychedelic
attitudes in general, especially because of labels as Eclipse, Time-Lag,
Important Records and others. So, how did Young God get involved in this
music? Could you see Angels Of Light as precursor of that kind of mood?

Larkin is a magic woman. She lives in the mountains in north Georgia. She
collects bones, smooth stones, and she casts spells. She worships the moon.
She is very beautiful, and her voice is like the passionate cry of a beast
heard echoing across the mountains just after a tremendous thunder storm,
when the air is alive with electricity. I don't consider her folk though -
she is pre folk, even pre- music. She is the sound of the eternal mother and
the wrath of all women. She goes barefoot everywhere, and her feet are
leathery and filthy. She wears jewels, glitter, and glistening insects in
her hair. She's great! We're doing a record together soon for YGR. I don't
know anything about the labels you mention. I live in the woods.

Which are the bands that you wish you had signed under Young God?

They're all dead!

Finally I read 'The Consumer', a piece that you wrote during different times
of your life. Could we expect any new writings from Micheal Gira in the
forthcoming years? And what kind of approach you'd choose for an ipotetic
new book?

I hate that book. I wish I had never written it. In fact, I wish the person
that wrote it never existed. What a horrible, creepy, selfish, malignant
prick I was. Thank god I am no longer me. I have no plans to write more
fiction. It would have to be completely different - positive, uplifting,
hopeful, naïve, joyous, wise. To do it, I would need to completely wipe my
mind clean. Who knows, it might happen...

By the way, what difference could you notice between the approach to the
lyrics of the new album and the previous ones? Did you change somehow your
attitute or you basically keep it the same?

As I say, I have no control over these issues. I think, objectively, the
words have changed, yes. There are many different words used on the record,
to describe many different things. I do wish however that words did not
exist. They seem to cloak reality in falsity.


I wonder how's your nowadays feelings about Swans' stuff: do you ever play
any Swans' songs in the future? I don't mean it in a nostalgic way, but
songs played with a different touch and by your nowadays taste (the 'Burning
World' tracks, for example)…

Oh, I play a few Swans songs live sometimes. A strange feeling. It feels
completely phony and false, but I do it anyway.

Do you think there'll be future for the Body Lovers and Body Haters
projects?

Absolutely not.

In your long career you realized so many records to mention, but I wonder if
there's anything you'd like to erase or even you wish you had done in a
different manner…

Like everyone, I'd like to erase everything and start over completely, a
newborn baby.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Angels of Light / M.Gira

Raw text interview for Flux Magazine july 07
>
> Why is the album called "We Are Him?"

Lately I've been thinking it's a good idea to just give up, let go,
disappear, not to have an identity. I wrote the song thinking about
something like the Nuremburg rallies, except not with Hitler at the podium,
but instead maybe an old fat naked clown covered in chocolate and flies,
gesticulating madly, pink foam bubbling out of his ears. The crowd was
comprised of people of all ages, all in a mad fervor, naked except for the
soiled diapers they wore, reaching into their poop sacks and smearing each
others faces and bodies with the contents, stomping their feet in a communal
tantrum, aping the words and gestures of their leader. They're chanting "We
Are Him."

>
> Do you see it as a return in some ways to the sound you had with Swans
> around "Love of Life" as there seem to be reasonable parallels?

Oh God no! I can't even remember those days. I've worked really hard on
forgetting all about Swans. I have nothing to do with it. It was someone
else. I killed that worthless piece of shit of a human being a long time
ago. The records still exist I guess, but they're artifacts, leavings, like
unsightly growths that were surgically removed from my body, left to dry and
shrivel in the sun, then scattered in the wind. In a way, Angels of Light is
a religious undertaking - I'm doing penance for all my years of selfishness
and sin.

>
> For example the backing vocals are often reminiscent of Jarboe and the album
> cover is in a similar style.... the title track especially would fit well on
> "Love of Life."

The cover is by the same artist, the magical British painter Deryk Thomas,
who to me is the rightful heir to Hieronymus Bosch, Francis Bacon, and Walt
Disney. But that's about it as far as similarities to Swans go, I'm afraid -
the fact that Deryk did the art. I completely and adamantly disagree that
any song on this record would fit on a Swans album. Then, when I wrote those
songs, I was a fairly intelligent ape. Now, in fairness, I think I could
accurately be described as a fairly (more) intelligent, but infinitely more
handsome, chimp. So, I write songs accordingly... All my Angels records
have had what I call "chick" vocals on 'em. I think it's important that a
male singer with a gravelly, less than mellifluous voice, associate himself
with beautiful women, and cloak himself in their voices. I guess it's the
old Serge Gainsbourg syndrome. Ya know, if you look and sound like a human
toad, surround yourself with glamorous women - in this case I was blessed
with the seductive charms of Ms. Larkin Grimm and Ms. Siobhan Duffy. You
might also be hearing akron/family as "female" vocals tho', since they often
sing like castrati...

>
> Do you feel Angels of Light could be fairly described as a folk band?

Sheesh, I don't know. You mean like Cat Stevens and James Taylor? Or Pete
Seeger? I don't think so. I always viewed Swans as a "folk" band tho',
especially in the early days, since I was singing "the people's" music, just
from a different perspective. Angels of Light, on the other hand, I guess
the name sounds folk. The music doesn't sound anything like folk and the
words don't relate at all to folk, but sure, let's call it folk. I live in
the mountains near Woodstock. I shoot the trout in my stream, and I scream
drunk at the stars at night, so yeah, I'm a "folk-rocker" after all these
years!
>
> One lyric that jumped out was, "When you open your mouth you're too stupid
> to scream" from 'Promise of Water' Was that inspired by a particular person
> or incident?

Well we're all just too stupid to scream, considering the predicament we've
allowed ourselves to slip into. That song is about being infected. Thoughts,
images, desires, ideas injected directly into your head and blood, where
George Bush is equal to Paris Hilton is equal to an internet stalker with a
hard-on beneath a towel caught on camera naked in the kitchen of his
intended victim is equal to some stupid rock band in their video is equal
to a poor African kid with flies in his eyes is equal to an American boy
getting his legs blown off in Iraq as 100s of thousand Iraqis themselves are
displaced or murdered or erupt in an orgy of willing slaughter and public
gore and revenge is equal to a slick car commercial with ironic contemporary
music is equal to myspace.com or The New York Times. I'm just taking it all
in, it's a phantasmagoria of wonder and possibility, more real than any
thoughts or reality I might come up with on my own. We're in a new age, for
sure. The only reality is pain, or possibly orgasm. Everything else is on
the news. But it's also a sort of heaven - at least our ancestors might have
thought so.

>
> This song seems almost prophetic of this summer in Britain, as much of the
> country is flooding!

I'm sorry to hear of your troubles. Count your blessings though. At least
you have a government with a sense of social responsibility, sure at least
to do their (flawed) human best to bring people to safety and clean up the
mess. In our case, over two years later, New Orleans is still a disaster
zone, just muck and mold. A short time ago bloated corpses floated down its
streets while dogs howled, quickly revisiting their bestial ways, rooting
for nourishment in the ripe intestines of the proud citizens of one of the
greatest and most historically rich cities in America... A disgrace! But I'm
as complicit in this crime as the next person...

>
> "The Visitor" hints at a belief in reincarnation - do you think you've lived
> before?

Good Gawd no, I'm not even sure I'm alive now.


>
> Is "The Visitor" about the death of a friend?

No, it's about the death of "me" (thank God! I think!) or the "me" I might
imagine myself to be, if I were to find myself in a song written by "me" ...
It's also a fairly jejune but earnest wish to die in my lovers arms...
>
> "The "Star Chaser" is a very moving song - is it a remembrance of all those
> you've known who have died?

Thanks! It's an homage to a person that once lived inside me. He's left a
hole in my chest, and I miss him.... But for heaven's sakes - no offense -
where does all the Death stuff come from? Anyway, no matter, this song is a
longing for the past, which at the time was not there, and now is even less
so, and only a few artifacts remain to hint at what never was.
>

> Is there a theme of mutation in the song "Sunflower's Here to Stay?"

First I saw my beloved Genesis P-Orridge leading a troupe of He/She
child-creatures through a maze of Mylar, metallic glitter snowflakes
clouding the air, then I saw my beloved Devendra Banhart leading a horde of
hairy feral children towards a phallic rock formation in the woods, then I
saw a half-goat / half-pig beast leading human rats to a chasm filled with
flames. He chugged wine and belched lighting, and his erection was truly
frightening. The human rats turned on him and were about to swarm him and
eat him when I woke up. Thank God! I wanted the music to sound like The
Beatles or The Turtles or or the early happy era of Pink Floyd, but of
course it didn't turn out that way.


>
> We seem to be living in times of rapid change. Where do you think the human
> race is heading?

Oh my God. I can't believe I was just asked that question. Please consult
someone with wisdom for an answer. I'm as naïve as the day I was born, thank
you.
>
> Have you heard of the black hole generator, the large hadron collider at
> CERN, that is going to be activated in November?
> Could it finally mean armageddon?

I sure hope so!!!!! Armageddon is good. It means we're all going to heaven -
at least I think I am.

The Wire

Lead Review

August 07


Soundcheck - This month's selected CDs and vinyl


The fifth album by Michael Gira's Angels Of Light achieves its
mythical depth and range with trance-fuelled abandon.

By Keith Moline

Angels Of Light
We Are Him
Young God CD

Michael Gira continues to suffer from having each new album, each new
fugitive direction he takes, compared with his early work, produced in
just a few short years in the early 80s. While his group Swans made
some of the slowest, heaviest and most grindingly relentless music
ever created on albums like Filth (1983) and Cop (1984), for more than
a decade of their lifespan - Gira disbanded the group in 1997 - their
work was multifaceted, sweeping and often acoustic. As for his later
work under the Angels Of Light banner, the unremitting moroseness that
Gira has often been accused of - perhaps not without justification
when you consider lines like "God damn anyone that says a kind word"
(from 1988's "God Damn The Sun") - has for the most part been replaced
by honest simplicity and generosity of spirit.

For this fifth Angels Of Light album, Gira has again recruited acid
pastoralists Akron/Family to realise his songs, which are usually
composed on acoustic guitar. Some of the musicians featured on early
releases New Mother (1999) and How I Loved You (2001) have returned to
flesh out We Are Him's arrangements. Gira has in the past bemoaned
his difficulty in resisting the temptation to obsess over sonic
details, but those who found the last couple of albums a little too
dry and sparse will surely enjoy this one's lusher textures. We Are
Him is the most widescreen Angles album to date without ever spilling
over into the production excesses of Swans; further, it retains the
freshness and immediacy that is a hallmark of Akron/Family's work.
Nothing feels superfluous; the instrumentation, though compellingly
mercurial, in never intrusive or overwrought, allowing Gira's
songwriting to command centre stage.

And a superb set of songs it is. His early work explored the
narratives opened up between each repetition of a single riff or line
of lyric, and how abjection, violence and blank nihilism could
multiply exponentially with each hammerblow drum kick or solemn
acoustic strum. The younger Gira may have been loath to admit to any
weakness - by his own account he could be a nasty piece of work - but
at the heart of all his music lay vulnerability and a longing for
transcendence. Such yearning was heightened rather than crushed by
his monolithic musical constructs.

The difference with We Are Him is that he has become adept at
expressing it all with such candour, precision and economy. Certainly
repetition still plays its part, as on the opening "Black River Song",
in which a monstrous blues riff cycles around on itself until the
album's first chord change, which arrives about ten seconds before the
song ends. But the repetition has nothing to do with bludgeoning
monomania; it's all about trance-fulled abandon and release.
Gira's words continue to conflate opposites of sin and redemption,
good and evil, hope and despair. In the past this bordered on the
gratuitous, a blunt undercutting of positive potential by sheer
boundless cynicism. But here it feels like an attempt to synthesise
something strong and true, as if they aren't opposites but mirror
images: "Black River runs, beneath the ground/Receiving the days that
feed the night/Black River flows through the belly of everyone/Fading,
growing, fading, flowing." In Gira's world, the breath of artistic
inspiration, the memory of departed friends and family,
personifications of love and cruelty, vengeful and forgiving gods, all
of these intermingle, coursing through the land, the body and even the
blood, though he is never explicit as to whether this is cause for
celebration or terror: "There is no place to run from Joseph's
truth/His hands are on your throat but feeding you" ("Joseph's Song").
If this all sounds like serious stuff, you're right. Yet there are
some sparkling pop songs on We Are Him. The title track is built on a
joyous glam rock stomp, bursting through a folk-drone intro and never
letting up, while pastel guitars open and close "The Man We Left
Behind", a waltz time confessional that crosses gossamer Byrdsian
Country rock with the offhand gravitas of Leonard Cohen. "Not
Here/Not Now" rides out on some inspired Western guitar twang and
"Sometimes I Dream I'm Hurting You" features goofy Nuggets-styles
garage rock organ, while "Sunflower's Here To Stay" even boasts a coda
that recalls The Turtles' "Happy Together" (though the title might
indicate that Gira actually had The Beach Boys in mind).
Generally, though, the mood is one of calm reflection. In the past
Gira's famed intensity has felt a bit too pat, his victories too
easily won; here, the power of a song like "Star Chaser" is heightened
by the restraint of its arrangement. It's another wrenching waltz
that recasts autobiographical detail into a kind of modern tragic
folklore. Gira has characterised himself as "the type of person that
immediately abstracts experience as it occurs" (in The Wire 233), and
it's this gift (or curse, perhaps) that imbues his work with a near
mythical depth and range. Nothing on We Are Him will startle like old
classics such as "Raping A Slave" or "A Screw", but these songs will
get under your skin (to use a recurring Gira image) and remain with
you for a long time to come.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Yourfleshmag.com

By james jackson toth

July 07

OK, now it's time to discuss the record of the month. As a longtime Swans
fanatic, I may be biased, but this latest Angels of Light album is a
masterpiece. Michael Gira has been steadily issuing Angels of Light albums
since the mid nineties and each one gets better and better, but We Are Him
[Young God] is not only his finest achievement but also easily one of the
year's best albums. Backed by members of Akron / Family, among others, the
meticulously layered instrumentation is the perfect foil to Gira's dry,
menacing vocals. Dirges and rockers sit side by side as songs are built on
single hiccupping electric guitar lines, trippy drones, and even Akron /
Family's collective vocal prowess, used to great effect throughout.
Absolutely perfect.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Paperthinwalls.com

http://www.paperthinwalls.com/singlefile/item?id=936


ANGELS OF LIGHT - "Black River Song"
from We Are Him (Young God)
NY Pastoral // Out August 20

At 52, well-dressed ex-Swan and Young God impresario Michael Gira is
releasing his fifth elegant Angels Of Light album, We Are Him; and it's
every bit as brilliant as 2003's epic record-to-beat Everything Is Good
Here/Please Come Home. Again backed by Akron/Family along with sundry
ex-Swans and NYC legends, "Black River Song" boils tiny squadrons of guitar
fire, percussion, brass and a Boschian mixed choir into a brimstone pulpit
from which Gira spits about the black river that soundlessly "flows through
the belly of everyone." It's a powerful opener that clips too soon. On the
album it spills into the more meditative pools of "Promise Of Water," led by
gentle shaker and Gira's forceful but lulling scowl: "When you open your
mouth/You're too stupid to scream."

Michael Gira on "Black River Song"

You organized a ton of people for the record. Who does what on this
particular track?
Seth from Akron played the weird picked clusters of electric guitars. Dana
from Akron played drums. There's actually two full takes of drums recorded
in different rooms—one with room sound, the other tight. Bill Rieflin
[Swans, Ministry, etc.] played the growling bass guitar. The fabulous
Siobhan Duffy and the marvelous Larkin Grim sang backing chick vocals. Seth,
Dana and Miles of Akron did the doo-wop vocals. Steve Moses of Alice Donut
played trombones. I played the acoustic guitar on which the song is based,
and sang my silly vocals. I think Bill played tambourines on the downbeat
too, but I can't remember for sure.

What's this black river running through us?
I was sitting on the toilet reading Coleridge's "Kubla Khan" and this bit
about a subterranean black river sent me dreaming. I interpret it as meaning
the dark chocolate that we all share inside us. It's like when you were a
teenager and your make-out girlfriend stuffed a whole bar of Hershey's
chocolate in her mouth, chewed it good, then you both swilled it back and
forth as you sucked each other's faces... Like that! The shared experience
of fecund sweetness, tralala. - BRANDON STOSUY
Wednesday, July 18th, 2007

Angels Of Light song Black River Song from the upcoming album We Are Him and the Lisa Germano song Paper Doll from the just released reissue of Lullaby For Liquid
Pig are now Free MP# downloads at the following links:

lisa: http://www.younggodrecords.com/product.asp?P_ID=48

Angels: http://www.younggodrecords.com/product.asp?P_ID=46

THIS RAW TEXT IS FOR AN ARTICLE BEING WRITTEN ABOUT DEVENDRA IN UNCUT
MAGAZINE UK

>> When and where did you first meet Devendra?

My wife, Siobhan Duffy, was on tour and her band played in Los Angeles.
She's an aficionado of all things Roots Music, Mountain Music, and also
anything elemental, from African music like Fela, to Captain Beefheart. She
knows when something's good, built to last. She was out in the parking lot
at this club in L.A. smoking a cigarette after her band had sound checked,
and she heard this unearthly voice emanating from the club. It was Devendra
sound-checking for the opening slot. She immediately went in, watched his
sound check, then watched his set. She knew she was witnessing someone
utterly unique. She bought his CDR for a dollar or two, and brought it home
to me after the tour. I was astounded. Like an angel/demon child singing to
you from back in time somewhere, telling you secrets you already knew but
had forgotten (these recordings were sometimes songs he'd sing into friend's
answering machines, or dictaphones, and these later became his wonderful
debut album "Oh Me Oh My..."). I wrote him an extremely long letter, and I
guess it convinced him, because he moved from L.A. to be on Young God
Records. He lived in squats, at friends houses, on our couch, etc. I knew
that would change quickly though, after he played his first New York show at
Tonic. I'd passed the word on about him to a lot of people, really demanded
they show up, so the place was full. He was a nervous wreck. But he came out
on stage, and at the last minute decided not to use his guitar for the first
song, and just stamped his boot for a rhythm and wailed the song, waiving
his arms around like a madman, his eyes lit up like a messianic insane
preacher. These cynical New Yorkers went nuts. He had 'em for the rest of
the show, just him and his little nylon string guitar. He was on his way.

>>
>> What were your first impressions of him?

Very few people have had the effect Devendra had on me. You just wanted to -
no, you HAD to love him, take him in, help him, protect him. He is a magnet.
God somehow decided that he should be especially blessed. He's a conduit for
something, he has access to some kind of energy most of us aren't privileged
to experience. I've seen it. He'd walk into a room, even when he was
completely unknown, sleeping in a squat, working as a dishwasher in a
restaurant, and people would just gravitate towards him, want to know about
him, then as I say, want to help, to lift him up. He is a magical being.

>>
>> What did you see in him that was special, musically?

Oh, just that he was possessed, that it flowed out of him obsessively but
beautiful, great finger-picking guitar that only comes with hours and hours
spent alone in a room playing constantly, and his VOICE, my god, what a
tremendous voice. And he's completely himself, not forced or contrived, and
his lyrics can be light at times, but also really poignant and funny, and
simultaneously scary or soulful. He's just IT, the whole package, a born
STAR, in the best sense of the word. He's extremely generous and gracious
too, as a true star should be.

>>
>> What about as a person? Is he the out-there hippie his press suggests? If
>> so, can you explain how?

As a person he is decent and real, but he's no fool. I guess he's sort of a
hippy, but I'm not one to judge - I love hippies. Really, he's done what
most people only dream about - create his own world, based on his
imagination. To me that's the definition of freedom.

>>
>> Do you have a great Devendra story?

He was very naïve about technical aspects of music in the early days, didn't
want to know and didn't care. As far as I know, he'd only played in coffee
shops or busked here and there. I was helping set up the mic for him on a
stand at an early show, and I mentioned he should be sure not to let it
drift - if he bumped it - so it pointed towards the monitor, which would
cause feedback. He said, "what's a monitor?" - ha ha ha!

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

THIS RAW TEXT IS FOR INTERVIEW IN WebzineNameless.net somewhere in Belgium I
think

Michael Gira
WebzineNameless.net, June 2007

- As it¹s said in the article on your YGR page, you don¹t want to give
any message but just want to sing and play music. Still your lyrics don¹t
seem to be innocent. They¹re full of violence, hatred sometimes, possession
or submission. What is it then that you want to say?

Xxxxxxx Well, every song is different. I'm not a politician or a preacher,
I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything. A song is its own world, its
own specific habitat, where unique animals, germs, microbes, wars,
histories, bad fucks, good tender love, and sweet baby's breath all live
together, enclosed, isolated and secure. I don't have anything to say that's
more valuable than what the other living creatures in the song/world could
offer. It's not up to me, anyway. The song controls me, overtakes me, and
I'm a guest inside myself. It's like a straightjacket made of my own body,
but liberating. It's like the movie Invasion Of The Body Snatchers. A song
is one of the Pod People. It both devours and becomes a new version of its
host. It's the Holy Ghost wagging your tongue. It's the Jesus flesh you eat
at your First Communion. It's the television feeding your consciousness,
sucking it back out of you and spewing your mind out into the universe.



- Those lyrics look somehow quite close to real poemsŠ

Xxxxxxxxxx What on earth is a "real" poem???? Anyway, doesn't matter, I
don't want to know, and I'm not much of a fan of poetry anyway. Thanks!



- Would you consider working on another spoken words album just like
the one you worked on with John Giorno?

Xxxxxxxxx I did an album reading my stories once (not poems). It was
called The Somniloquist (means someone talking in their sleep), but I don't
like "spoken word" very much. I think it's largely a self indulgent
enterprise, like comedy, except with less social value. I personally tried
to read like a university professor of mathematics, how that person might
read the phone book, name after name, when I did the album. A punishment for
wicked children, to teach them the pain and value of discipline.



- Why accepting interviews when everything seems to be said on your
YGR page? This page seems to be so complete about youŠ Moreover it¹s also
written that you¹re not really into giving interviews, unless you decide to
do itŠ So would there be something new you¹d want to add to it?

Xxxxxxxxxx Oh, I have nothing to say, but like most people, I am happy to
say it so long as you will let me talk, for ever and ever, thank you.



- It¹s also said therein that you wouldn¹t want to always play with
one and only one band, not to end up mimicking your own sound, which seems
to have been something very important to you since you put an end to Swans.
Still, now you seem to prefer working with the same people, that is to say
mainly the boys from Akron/Family. Even though they¹re very creative and you
keep on adding new contributions to the album, don¹t you fear, at one point,
forming a new band with Akron and ending up doing the same music again and
again?

Xxxxxx Akron/Family played less of a role on this album than our past
collaborations. The songs were the bed frame. Akron were the mattress.
Everyone else fucked on top of the mattress... I may work with individual
members of akron again, I don't know. I'm not worried about it. I have no
songs right now. I'm at that point where I fear I'll never write another
song anyway. The monkey that used to live inside my skull and write the
songs is now choking me to death instead. But it's beautiful, this choking
business - what colors!





- What were you thinking of when composing ³We Are Him²?

Xxxxxxxxxxx You know, you're having sex, you're pumping away, pumping,
pumping, climbing the slippery slope, about to reach the top, you can feel
it, you can feel it, feel it, here it comes, here it comes, then you decide
to stop it, STOP(!!!),you just refuse to release, you hold it in, hold it in
(!), you suck it all the way back inside you and it shapes itself into an
angry fist, and it stays there, tight and hard in the pit of your belly...
Then you get out of bed and immediately get into the cold, cold (!) shower.
That shower, the feeling of that shower, is how I wanted the album to sound.



- The Angels of Light suddenly became Angels of Light. Is there any
reason behind this loss of article?

Xxxxxx None whatsoever. I wasn't even aware that it had happened. Thank
you for pointing it out.



- What is the last thing that touched you so hard the only thing you
wanted to do was to write something about it (like a song, a story, a
bookŠ)?


Xxxxxxx I don't work that way. Maybe I should. Maybe I'll try to in the
future - I'd be a better, more moral person I suppose. Instead, sadly, my
head is an empty cup, and sometimes events, images, memories fill it up.
When some of that mixture spills out by accident, it's what I laughingly
call a "song."



- After 25 years of career and being now more than a maturing artist,
do you think you have reached some kind of musical wisdom? Or are you still
looking for some place through music where you could finally feel like
totally free?

Xxxxxxxx I think the main reason I keep going is because have learned
nothing. I remain perpetually naïve. Always, the next time will be the true
source of ecstasy, always the next time. I guess I still make music for the
same reason men cheat on their wives.





- What is it that keeps you doing music and wanting to promote new
artist?

Fear. Fear of poverty. Fear of failure. Fear of love. Fear of actually
discovering that the world exists, in and of itself, perfectly formed,
perfectly realized, not in need of my terrible meddling!



- Would you be able to foresee the future of independent music and
folk music in general, how do you think it would look like?

Xxxxxxxxxx Yes, I am a prophet. All musicians will cease to make music,
except as a hobby, because they will be unable to afford to record their
music, or earn a living through their music, because there will be no market
for it, since all music will be immediately stolen and free on the internet.


- Always looking straight at the camera on your press pictures, is it
some kind of honesty you would want people to take from you?

Xxxxx It is a special trick of mine. My eyes are actually closed, looking
backwards into my mind. I am seeing nothing of the world. I am looking into
myself, not at you. What colors!



Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


THIS RAW TEXT IS FOR AN INTERVIEW TO APPEAR IN FRANCE IN ELEGY MAGAZINE:



>
> Angels of Light
> Who is Josephwho inspired every song ? What¹s this honor worth? Is he
> a friend or a kind of biblical hero?

Joseph is a friend I've had since as long as I can remember. He lives just
behind my head. Sometimes he enters my skull and I become him for a brief
period. I'm like a puppet, animated by him, at the best of times. He's the
holy spirit, the holy devil, both animus and guardian angel.
>
> The Young Akron Boys are again playing on this album. Do they also
> participate to the creative process?

For this album, they were less involved than on the previous Angel's album
"Other People." They provided the basic grooves, the first response to the
songs. Bill rieflin and christoph hahn added an immense amount on this
album. Everyone I work with adds a bit of their personality. I'm more
interested in the personality of the players, rather than specifically what
instrument they play. Bill is all over this record. He's great to hang out
with - intelligent, with a biting sense of humor, and a musical wizard. I'd
hire him to be on my record even if he didn't play anything. He played
drums, guitar, organ, synthesizer, vocals, more instruments than I can
remember. He always adds a new dimension to things. That's him playing the
deep bass on "Black River Song" for instance. It really puts the song down
in the mud, where it belongs. That song needs to grovel in the slime, then
march up to heaven... Christoph is a great friend too, a real sweetheart...
He plays guitar like an american, more like an american than most americans,
but he's german and lives in Berlin. I call his style "kraut-abilly." That's
his guitar line on "My Brother's Man" for instance. Before his addition, it
was just strummed guitars, but he added a very demented blues feel to it, a
snaking line, like a last insult as the knife works its way in. Christoph
truly made the song live in the belly. He's a wise man, a dirty, greasy,
wolf-like German. Christoph is THE man!
>
> What about Siobhan Duffy (ex-GodCo and Flux Information Sciences),
> Julia Kent and Bill Rieflin who are also faithful companions on your
> work?

Julia is demure, sophisticated, and generous, and it shows in her playing.
Siobhan is one of the most musical people I've ever met. She sings all the
time, has thousands of songs in her head. She's the one who brought Devendra
to my attention. She heard his voice once, and right away knew he was a
young avatar. Siobhan is temporarily retired from music, but she still
agrees to sing on my records...




>
> What has become of Flux Information Sciences by the way? Is it split?

Yes, gone, sadly.
>
> Your lyrics often deal with the senses and the body and many things
> seem to happen inside of the narrator, beneath the skin. How do you
> explain?

Sheesh! I think that's too deep for me. Also, I don't think it's accurate. I
sing about flowers and stars and all the pretty nice things too for god's
sake - ha ha! I'm in love with the world. Each breath is divine essence
filtering into my body, exhaled back out into god's body. A closed system,
stinking and putrid and beautiful and perfumed, drifting, dissipating,
congealing, reborn!

>
> The sun and the sea are elements that appear quite often in your lyrics
> too. Is it conscious?

I am from california. I was raised a surfer boy. I had long blond hair as a
kid, I was always tan, and I grew up listening to the beach boys. We went
barefoot everywhere. The salt from the ocean powdered our young bodies. We
all took drugs, eventually our teeth fell out, and our faces shriveled like
bacon. The sun. the sea.

>
> Does an Angel of Light needs the sea and sun to survive?

I don't know any true angels of light. I am an imposter, a phony, a sham,
and I deserve to be shot, lined up against the wall and executed, my slumped
body chewed at by dogs.

>
> What kind of emotions do you try to convey? Or maybe, you don¹t try
> anything, it just happens naturally and intuitively?

My favorite emotions are urine, and apples. I strive always to bring the
sour scent of urine to the surface, laced with the sweet sharp tang of
apples.

>
> What do you mean by ³We are him²? Who is ³we² and who is ³him²?

I was imagining Elvis Presley, or The Dalai Lama, or Jesus Christ, or Adolf
Hitler, or John Lennon, or Thurston Moore. We're all the same. We all want
to leave our bodies.


>
> What do you mean by being ³My Brother¹s Man²?

My brother is my best friend. He's a murderer, but also a saint. He's a
homeless, thieving bum, but his hands are clean. His face is caked with
black mud, but his eyes are like diamonds. I'm his right hand man.

>
> Why didn¹t you play ATP with Akron/Family?

I wasn't asked.
>
> I watched the horror movie Candyman recently and I wondered if the baby
> babbling sample we can hear at the very start of the Swans album White
> Light from the mouth of infinity didn¹t come from this movie?

Ha ha ha ha! You have got to be kidding me. No, no, that was a friend's
baby. He brought the baby to the studio and I liked the way she sang. Better
than me.
>
> By the way, Deryk Thomas who designed this very Swans album has worked
> on the cover of your new album. What made you feel like working with
> him again now? How did you meetby the way ? How do you work
> together? Has he ³carte blanche²?

Deryk is a true genius. A perfect blend of Hieronymus Bosch and Walt Disney.
I don't know, his artwork seemed to fit for this record. You should send
your readers here: http://www.derykthomas.com

>
>
> You¹re going to release an album of Faust/Nurse With Wound. What about
> it? Are you very familiar with the work of theses two bands?

This is the first I've heard of this! Good idea! When does it come out????
>
> What else do you plan on Young God Records?

There's a new album by Akron/Family, their best yet, due out in September.
It's called Love Is Simple. I am also working with the wonderful Ms. Larkin
Grimm. She is a beautiful mountain-woman with a spectacular voice and she
sings songs that are incantations, backwoods voodoo. Her album will be out
early next year (she also sang on the new angels record). Then I am also
working with Fire On Fire. They used to be the art/prog/punk/chaos outfit
Cerberus Shoal, but they ditched their electric instruments and they all
play acoustic instruments now, but fiercely, not "folky", and they all sing
elemental American music that sounds like The Mamas And The Pappas meets
Flatt and Scruggs. Their album will also be out early next year. We will all
tour together - Larkin, Fire On Fire, and myself, next year. Lots and lots
of smelly but good looking Americans coming to your town.

>
> What is the Young God record you¹re the most proud of?

Probably Devendra's "Oh Me Oh My..." - I had nothing to do with producing it
of course, it's recorded in the crudest, simplest ways, it's all him being
born, this beautiful jewel, a hairy, hungry angel slipping out of the womb
and into the world.

>
> A word about Lisa Germano?

I've loved Lisa's music for years. Her voice sounds like a lover whispering
in your ear. She's a dream. I'm really happy that we were able to release
her new album In The Maybe World but also now, probably my favorite record
of hers, Lullaby For Liquid Pig - beautifully recorded, like a secret world
all its own, mostly songs about drinking, lost in drunkenness...

>
> You told me once that Bob Dylan was the best songwriter according to
> you. What is the Bob Dylan album everyone should own?

Oh yes, Dylan is the best, no question, beyond debate. I can't say which one
everyone should own, but if I had to choose for myself, it would be John
Wesley Harding. I associate it with my childhood. I listened to it hundreds
of times when I was young, over and over. I had it memorized, I could just
listen to it in my head without having to actually play it, just run it
through from beginning to end as I went to sleep...

>
> When do you play in France again?

I think maybe in october...
>
> Thanks a lot!

No problem, thanks to you too...

Michael Gira is playing these two dates in July at festivals in Belgium and
Scotland. He'll be playing solo, with his acoustic guitar and what's left of
his voice. Songs will include many from the forthcoming Angels Of Light
album We Are Him, as well as selected favorites from Angels and Swans back
catalog.

14/07/07 : Dourfestival - Dour (B)
15/07/07 : Indian summer - Glasgow (UK)

This is just a brief news item to let you know that the fabulous Lisa
Germano has seen fit to allow us to re-release her woozy and amazingly
beautiful classic Lullaby For Liquid Pig on young god records. It's
available now at the website younggodrecords.com and it includes
a free 57 min bonus CD of home and live recordings, in a pretty damn
sumptuous double digipack, for the price of a single CD...

To learn more / purchase click here:


younggodrecords.com/product.asp?P_ID=48


There's a huge amount going on here at YGR, and I'll send out a proper
newsletter within the week.

The infamous YGR discuss page is back up, replete with obscure political and
philosophical discourse, as well as post-adolescent male invective and other
self indulgent juvenilia...
To partake or lurk, go here:

younggodrecords.com/discuss_default.asp

All the best!

Michael Gira / YGR

The fabulous Larkin Grimm (future Young God Records recording artist)
performs live solo and does an interview too for one hour this Sunday April
15 on David Garland's NYC Public Radio (WNYC) show Spinning On Air at 7 PM
EST. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!!!! It's 93.9 FM on the radio, but if you're
outside the NYC area you can listen live at the link below. Do it! Do it
now! All the Best, Michael Gira/Young God Records Master

HERE'S THE LINK: wnyc.org/shows/spinning

more Larkin info larkingrimm.com

I really appreciate
that you've shown interest in the music.
Unfortunately, I've just moved to
the mountains and find myself with a dial up
56k internet connection for the time being,
so I'm unable to traverse the ultra high tech world
of myspace with any efficiency!

For instance, it takes 5 minutes for a simple page
to load in my computer. Sheesh!

I'll have a broadband connection soon,
and I'll then become much more interactive with
the myspace pages that Frank at serenta
has been kind enough to set up on my behalf.
I'll be sending out an extensive newsletter
very soon regarding the goings-on at young god records,
angels of light, my own work etc..

If you'd like to receive it please sign
up at younggodrecords.com
...also of interest at the website
(aside from the music) is the discussion board
younggodrecords.com/discuss_default.asp
it's not just about music. Any and all subjects are welcome,
and your participation is solicited...

All the best! Michael Gira