''The Glowing Man'' is the fourteenth studio album by American

experimental rock Experimental rock, also called avant-rock, is a subgenre of rock music that pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique or which experiments with the basic elements of the genre. Artists aim to liberate and innovate, with ...

band

Swans Swans are birds of the family Anatidae within the genus ''Cygnus''. The swans' closest relatives include the geese and ducks. Swans are grouped with the closely related geese in the subfamily Anserinae where they form the tribe Cygnini. Someti ...

, released on June 17, 2016 on Young God and

Mute Muteness is a speech disorder in which a person lacks the ability to speak. Mute or the Mute may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Film and television * ''Mute'' (2005 film), a short film by Melissa Joan Hart * ''Mute'' (2018 film), a scien ...

. It is considered the third and final part of a three-album "trilogy", the other two parts being ''

The Seer The Seer may refer to: Film and television * ''The Seer'' (film), a 2007 Italian thriller and horror film * "The Seer" (''Sliders''), an episode of the TV series * "The Seer" (''Stargate Atlantis''), an episode of the TV series * "The Seer" ...

'' and ''

To Be Kind ''To Be Kind'' is the thirteenth studio album by American experimental rock band Swans, released on May 12, 2014. It was released as a triple LP, a double CD, and a two-CD deluxe edition that includes a live DVD of performances from Hellfest Ope ...

''. The song "The World Looks Red/The World Looks Black" contains lyrics written by frontman

Michael Gira Michael Rolfe Gira (; born February 19, 1954) is an American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, author and artist. He is the main force behind the New York City musical group Swans and fronted Angels of Light. He is also the founder of ...

that were used in the Sonic Youth song "The World Looks Red" in 1983; the music is new, with no relation to the earlier version. Swans and Sonic Youth both developed in the early 1980s

post-punk Post-punk (originally called new musick) is a broad music genre, genre of Punk Music, punk music that emerged in the late 1970s as musicians departed from punk's traditional elements and raw simplicity, instead adopting a variety of avant-garde s ...

/ no wave scene of

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

, and Sonic Youth's

Thurston Moore Thurston Joseph Moore (born July 25, 1958) is an American musician best known as a member of Sonic Youth. He has also participated in many solo and group collaborations outside Sonic Youth, as well as running the Ecstatic Peace! record label. Mo ...

was an early member of Swans appearing on the live album ''

Body to Body, Job to Job ''Body to Body, Job to Job'' (stylized on the cover as ''Body To Body Job To Job.'') is the third compilation album by the American experimental rock band Swans. It was released simultaneously on LP, CD and audio cassette in 1991. It present ...

'' (recorded 1982–85, released 1991). The title track for ''The Glowing Man'' has previously been referred to as "Black Hole Man" and " Black-Eyed Man" and includes a section of "Bring the Sun / Toussaint L'Ouverture" from the 2014 album ''To Be Kind''. The song "When Will I Return?" was uploaded to YouTube on May 27, 2016. Prior to its appearance on ''The Glowing Man'', "Frankie M." was part of Swans' live sets as early as 2014, its length and arrangements differing each time it was performed.

Critical reception

''The Glowing Man'' was met with widespread critical acclaim. At

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from critics, the album received an average score of 81, based on 22 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim". Writing for '' Exclaim!'', Griffin J. Elliot called the album "a meticulous exercise in the band's streamlining their abstract sound, taking what they've done before and playing it under a newer, grander spotlight." Saby Reyes-Kulkarni wrote for ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to ...

'', "The love in ira'smusic is as terrible as it is beautiful, a wrenching act of spiritual determination. Swans make this sound effortless, though, in a fitting end to a remarkable chapter of their career." Paul Simpson of

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databa ...

gave the album four out of five stars, describing the album as "another exhilarating portal into the unknown." Louis Pattison, writing for ''

Uncut Uncut may refer to: * ''Uncut'' (film), a 1997 Canadian docudrama film by John Greyson about censorship * ''Uncut'' (magazine), a monthly British magazine with a focus on music, which began publishing in May 1997 * '' BET: Uncut'', a Black Enter ...

'', claimed the album is "gesturing towards something more contemplative" and is "certainly weathered by the journey." In a more mixed review, ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its ...

s Christopher R. Weingarten stated that "While their long, drawn-out, circling dark clouds remain potent, ultimately ''The Glowing Man'' is the weakest of the three powerful epics they’ve released since 2012." Several music criticism websites included ''The Glowing Man'' on their lists of the best albums of 2016. ''

Rockdelux ''Rockdelux'' is a Spanish music magazine. History and profile ''Rockdelux'' was first published in November 1984, and celebrated its 200th anniversary in October 2002, when it released a list of the 200 greatest international albums of all tim ...

'' ranked the album at twelfth in their top international albums of the year. Sputnikmusic ranked it at thirty-eighth, with staff member Raul Stanciu writing that " 'The Glowing Man''takes an important step forward for Swans, thus deserving its place as another significant achievement in their discography." ''

The Quietus ''The Quietus'' is a British online music and pop culture magazine founded by John Doran and Luke Turner. The site is an editorially independent publication led by Doran with a group of freelance journalists and critics. Content ''The Quietu ...

'' placed the album at eighty-seventh on their list, with writer Lior Phillips writing "the instrumentalists ripple out in meditative layers, never covering over or distracting from it, but rather reinforcing."

Accolades

Track listing

Personnel

Adapted from the official Young God Records website: Swans *

– vocals,

electric Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described by ...

and acoustic guitar *

Kristof Hahn Kristof Hahn (also known as Christoph Hahn) (born 6 February 1959) is a German guitarist., composer and translator. Hahn is best known for his lap-steel guitar playing in the New York experimental rock band Swans. He joined the band in 1989 for ...

– lap steel guitar, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, vocals *

Thor Harris Thor Harris (born February 7, 1965) is an artist, sculptor, musician, painter, carpenter and handyman. He was the percussionist for Swans (2010–2016). He has performed with Shearwater (2001–2010), Bill Callahan, The Angels of Light, Lisa ...

–

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Ex ...

, vibes and bells, hammered dulcimer * Christopher Pravdica –

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

, vocals *

Phil Puleo Phil Puleo (born September 27, 1963) is an American composer, drummer, illustrator and visual artist from New York. He is known as a founding member of the band Cop Shoot Cop in the 1990s, and for his current involvement in the experimental rock ...

– drums, hammered dulcimer, vocals *

Norman Westberg Norman Westberg is a guitarist from Detroit best known for his work with Swans. Present through almost the entirety of the band's existence, Westberg was brought on for Swans' debut album '' Filth'' (1983) and appeared on every album through 199 ...

– electric guitar, vocals Guests *

Bill Rieflin William Frederick Rieflin (September 30, 1960 – March 24, 2020) was an American musician. Rieflin came to prominence in the 1990s mainly for his work as a drummer with groups (particularly in the industrial rock and industrial metal scene ...

– drums,

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keybo ...

synth A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...

, Mellotron, bass guitar, electric guitar, vocals * Jennifer Gira – lead vocals on "When Will I Return?" * Okkyung Lee –

cello The cello ( ; plural ''celli'' or ''cellos'') or violoncello ( ; ) is a bowed (sometimes plucked and occasionally hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually tuned in perfect fifths: from low to high, C2, G ...

on "Cloud of Unknowing" * Bach Norwood –

double bass The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox additions such as the octobass). Similar i ...

* Kaela Sinclair – backing vocals * Katrina Cain – backing vocals * Buffi Jacobs –

* Daniel Hart –

violin The violin, sometimes known as a '' fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone ( string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument ( soprano) in the family in regu ...

* Gerald Jones – mandolin, banjo * Stuart Mack –

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

* Joakim Toftgaard –

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate ...

* Rachel Woolf – flute

Charts

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Glowing Man, The 2016 albums Swans (band) albums Albums produced by Michael Gira Young God Records albums Mute Records albums Albums recorded at Sonic Ranch