From Fuzedmag

For those of you who saw the new issue and said, ‘What the hell is Godspeed You! Black Emperor’ here is a little bit of information. Firstly, Godspeed is a nine-piece band from Montreal that are, in essence, a rock ‘n roll orchestra. They record epic songs that shape soundscapes in your mind. The brains behind the band, a man named Efrim, utilizes what is known as ‘found sound’ to set the tone of a song. Sound clips that have been used range from the hilarious, to the obscene, to the moving, to the disturbing, and his band of electrics and winds play along to the words. They build each song from the bottom layer, creating each step as though it were a home, rising floor by floor until an apocalyptic climax that hits the notes you’ve been dying to hear for, generally, the last seven minutes or so. They are a frighteningly talented band that many have tried to replicate, but none have successfully managed to match their combined force. In honour of them, and because we cannot use sentences to fully explain to you why we are featuring them, this is a list of the twenty reasons, in no particular order, why to love them.

1. The fact that each song can be counted on being at least ten minutes long.

2. Sound clips that denounce the American government, recall sightings of Jesus, and reminisce over Coney Island.

3. Jam sessions that last for nine minutes.

4. The painting of a picture using nothing but music.

5. Sixteen minutes into ‘Rockets Fall On Rocket Falls.’

6. How each album becomes the soundtrack to your existence.

7. Whenever you fade into an abyss that the music hypnotizes you into, a sudden lurch of instrumental explosion jumpstarts you back into reality.

8. The sentence ‘I don’t like the way the government is ran, don’t you know…’ that begins the band’s most horrifying song ‘bbf3.’

9. The fact that Lee Marvin’s voice is the first thing this band ever committed to record.

10. If you listen to one of their records on a train you will be the most relaxed person on the planet.

11. They aren’t quite rock, they aren’t quite anything.

12. The fact that for their latest record Yanqui U.X.O. the album art consisted of a graph connecting record labels with bomb manufacturers, and they weren’t lying.

13. How a group of individuals could be so focused on their work as to sacrifice all possibility of a commercial hit or radio play of any kind.

14. If you play one of their songs for a rap fan they will either reply with: ‘This is the worst song I’ve ever heard’ or ‘Put on Fiddy.’ Moreover, you’ll take great joy in hearing them say that.

15. You’ll never do air-violin for any other band.

16. If you read a book and promise to read until their third record Lift Your Skiny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven is over then you can be sure you’ll be at least half way through the book by the end.

17. You’ll never get a Godspeed! song stuck in your head.

18. How the band claims to be political, but you would never know because there are no lyrics. Emotions exist within each song, but you feel it through the vibrations. They could never add a lyricist, because the music speaks more words then lyrics possibly could.

19. If you listen to ‘Storm’ in your car then you’ll burn past the speed limit.

20. The composition of each song would have Bach jealous, Mozart brain-dead, and Beethoven, well, deafer?

Someone once asked me which songs they should ‘get’ (i.e. download) to listen to some good Godspeed! tracks. I told them simply to buy records, because the band cannot be listened to in terms of individual songs. It’s an entire movement. Small pockets of melody exist within each track, but the grand picture is something much more profound and exciting then simply one snippet of the record. If you eliminate one part then the entire point is lost. So that is what I say to you: if you see a record or have an opportunity to hear one, lend your life to it, because it will become a part of you in much deeper ways then anything generic ever possibly could. Godspeed You! Black Emperor burn through their orchestrations with fury and then once it ends in a flash a timer goes off in your head and you realise then that your life just changed forever.