- Record Label: Constellation
- Release Date: Mar 31, 2015
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Mar 31, 2015Everything swirls in cacophonous, ever repeating, four-beat drones; only Trudeau's violins offer variation in a frenzied, harmonic counterpoint.
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Mar 26, 2015Asunder is polemical in its trudge, drawing out notes the way a politician pauses between words to emphasize their meaning. As with 2012’s Allelujah! Don’t Bend! Ascend!, Godspeed pulls it off.
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Mar 30, 2015Asunder, Sweet is Godspeed at their most conciliatory, most bloody-minded and most untouchable.
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Jun 11, 2015For the first time in years, Godspeed is both operating at peak strength and not (as far we know) about to go on hiatus.
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Mar 31, 2015This is a beautiful, concise blast that conveys this band's musical essence.
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MojoMay 20, 2015This is music of compelling intensity. [Jun 2015, p.92]
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Apr 6, 2015The message might be shorter this time around, but it is just as pointed and effective.
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Apr 2, 2015Their vision remains a bleak one--but it makes resistance sound holy, and love sound like a revolutionary act.
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May 7, 2015The album frequently descends into seemingly chaotic feedback and amp fuzz but the dirt is very much artfully, deliberately applied.
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Mar 26, 2015It requires some patience, but it's worth sitting through the less immediately gratifying moments for the final section's payoff.
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Mar 31, 2015It’s a true piece of art, and we’re lucky Godspeed You! Black Emperor gave listeners a proper document.
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Apr 1, 2015You have to let your guard down, and Godspeed have to transform feelings into compelling records. They're still on track.
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Apr 3, 2015Asunder, Sweet and Other Distress is, without a doubt, and seemingly with all intention, their most immediate record to date.
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Apr 24, 2015The band’s signature slow riffs and brutal, unison forces are all present, while it’s between these chord changes that the interplay of feedback, overtones, drones and whistles play, against and with, in and out of the bludgeoning drive of the enormous, portentous menhirs of minor melody.
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Mar 30, 2015Exchanging their volatile tendencies for restraint and focus, Godspeed You! Black Emperor have created another incredible work and one that finds them again evading the confines of formula--even if it happens to be their own.
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Mar 26, 2015It’s post-apocalyptic, and it’s a gorgeous awakening for a band that continues to define the standard within its genre.
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Mar 31, 2015Despite its brevity, Asunder has more meat on its bones. And though it calls back to many of the strengths of early GY!BE albums, it also highlights an evolution of intent.
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Mar 26, 2015Asunder, Sweet begins in devastation and lament, takes time to plot, then surges with a single purpose: it is resolute and defiant, much like the players themselves.
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Apr 9, 2015Asunder, Sweet and Other Distress’ is good enough, by post-rock standards. But it really falls short of the bar that GY!BE set themselves before they took a break from the game.
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Mar 30, 2015This relatively curt 40-minute set--the Montreal multi-instrumentalists’ second recording since their lengthy hiatus ended in 2010--ranks among their most immediate.
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Apr 2, 2015The occasional soppiness of post-rock, which ultimately rendered it a dirty word in certain circles, has all but disappeared from the work of its godparents. Godspeed You! Black Emperor are now truly playing the music they were destined to play, and in its purest, weightiest possible form.
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The WireMay 15, 2015Perhaps their most forceful to date. [May 2015, p.49]
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Apr 6, 2015Asunder, Sweet And Other Distress’ is not a failure; it’s merely familiar.
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UncutMar 30, 2015[The album] follows a familiar trajectory: martial climaxes and blackened ambient passages, bombast and afterburn. Rarely, though, has that trajectory been charted so effectively. [May 2015, p.82]
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Mar 31, 2015Asunder may not be the second or third best Godspeed record but its likely to be one of the best records you hear this year and heralds a band that is not yet done creatively.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 52 out of 61
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Mixed: 7 out of 61
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Negative: 2 out of 61
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Jun 5, 2015
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Mar 31, 2015
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May 11, 2020