Customer Reviews
Post-apocalypse soundtracks - By: Earthshaker, 06 Sep 2008 
You scarcely notice that the album has started: there's just a growing drone, then a male voice begins to speak: "The car's on fire - & there's no driver at the wheel." Gradually, sentence by sentence, he describes the collapse of urban civilisation. You look at your watch & realise that the standard length of a pop single has already passed & this is still just beginning ...
It's not party music, then;in fact, it's light years away from what's generally accepted as popular music at all. The three tracks clockin at 20 minutes or so each. Each is not a "song" as popular music has understood it, but a suite of several different sections. The instrumentation is surprisingly traditional, guitars & strings (even bagpipes) but deployed to form a drone-heavy sonic landscape more associated with electronic distortion. Voices are rare, generally spoken word sections and/or cut-ups like the one cited above; drums, likewise, occur oncein a blue moon. There are long, slow, muted sections, there are occasional loud, fast sections, & oncein a while there's a delicate little tune lostin the distance; all of it tied together by an overarching atmosphere of loss & regret.
I liked it: I'm always prepared to salute people wanting to do something different & break out of the straitjacket of the "pop song". If someone wants to stretch out & take 20 minutes, do away with a thudding beat to hammer home the obvious rhythm, experiment with textures rather than banal words, that's fine by me, & this gets 4 stars accordingly. I can't deny, however, that some of the more negative points made by earlier reviewers have validity. There is, for instance, no real logic that designates these four bits of music as part of one composition & those three bits as part of another: you could have placed the track divisionsin totally different places, or indeed have presented this as an 11-track album, without changing a note. There's also, undoubtedly, an element of sameness about it: slow-and-quiet / slow-and-loud just about covers a lot of the album. All of which is to say that although this certainly seeks to stretch our concept of popular music, you are not going to find an hour's worth of "composed" music with an overarching logicin which one part builds on another & there's a sense of necessary consequences being explored: this is not Beethoven, there isn't that level of attention to the import of each individual note, & it doesn't repay that sort of listening. It does make an extremely good soundtrack, however,in the right mood, be that indoors or out: I have particularly strong memories of listening to it sittingin the carin an empty multistorey car parkin Croydon, on one of the grey mornings between Christmas & New Year. (Come to think of it, that image might well sum up the mood of the album better than anything I've said above!) So, could actually be 3 stars for there being, maybe, less to this than there seems at first, but I'll give it 4 for being prepared to do something different. I hope, however, that I've described itin such a way as to make it clear that this is the sort of thing that divides people & anything from 5 to 1 (or less) is entirely believable, according to personal taste. I like it; I hope you will; but I won't hold it against you if you hate it. Give it a go, anyway.
Sounds nice in places.... - By: Mr. Paul Stevenson, 18 Dec 2007 
There is just too much silence here for my liking. I'm a fan of the actual music that Godspeed create but theres just not enough here to keep my attention. It seems that most of the album is made up of ambient noise or just silence. The first & second tracks left me feeling tired & bored, i was looking for tracks with long build ups, reaching epic conclusions, fooling, surprising & inspiring me. Well i got one, part 3 was a pretty great listen, all 29 minutes of it, nice variety of instruments, driving drums, careful use of strings, real ebb & flow, very nice. I can't recommend a CD with one nice track, even if it is 29 minutes long minus yet more silence. Havn't heard any other Godspeed stuff so i can't compare, but this album is definately wantingin both material & variety departments.
I bought this on a whim... and it's amazing - By: Dominic Goulding, 05 Dec 2007 
I literally just bought this out of curiosity because I'd heard the odd good thing about it here & there. As soon as Dead Flag Blues kickedin I was blown away. It begins by setting the scene with a stark monologue, before the violins glide in.
Inside about the first 2 minutes you know you'rein for something special. I would say this is a concept album, it seems to be anyway, on the theme of modern livingin an industrial society. It conveys so many emotions over the hour, but overall it is uplifting & hopeful.
It's a very hard album to describe because it's basically an hour of ambient/chillout music with some voice samples & sound effects to carry the "story" along.
I think someone said, think Pink Floyd without the vocals, regarding this album; & they'd be right. One of the best progressive albums I've heardin some time. I'm pretty eager to get some more stuff by this band now.
Peace,
Dom x
Wow. - By: MrMetalFlower, 20 Jun 2007 The only word I can ever think of after listening to this album. This album is certainly GY!BE's most debated-about album. On one side we have "This is a debut, they improve" on the other we have "This cannot be bettered, not even by themselves". I am on the latter side. No offense to 'Lift Your Skinny Fists...' or 'Slow Riot...', but even you two don't match up to this.
This album tells a bleak, apocalyptic story. The darkness of the songs are consuming- you can't help but get deep into them. They don't just "tell a story", for example power-metal wise. The only way one could really find out the story told is by listening to the album all the way through & paying close attention to the voice clips. They all link together. I'll leave you to work this out for yourself.
This album is almost like a prelude to 'Slow Riot...', 'Moya' & 'BBF3' seeming to continue on the story, 'BBF3' containing an interview with Blaze Bayley, ex-Iron Maiden member, lamenting on the demise & corruption of the world. If you notice, the clip at the start of 'Providence' is spoken by the same two people from 'BBF3''s interview, but not exactly "from" the interview itself. Just, y'know, a discussion on the world ending.
This album is amazing. It meanders like a polluted river with nothing to affect its path but humanity's influence. One second it's calm, quiet & very noticeably ominous, the next militaristic, the next reaching an amazing climax that makes those long, long songs so worthwhile. Listening to this album is like being held by your mother as a baby while being told exactly how & when you are going to die.
I will of course mention 28 Days Later. Of course, it fits amazingly. When I found out that they had done this I was, well, overjoyed, having long before been acquainted with GY!BE.
Do I have any complaints about this masterpiece? Well, only one, that the silencein Providence feels rather unnecessary. But that is like saying there is one straggly hair on a newborn baby.
With this album you can't help but follow it all the way to oblivion.
And of course, everythingin the album is immensly complex. Even this review could be considered part of the complexity: each word could be interpretedin different ways. Each sound brings you along with it. I don't know where to end this review. I think I'll end it here, with a warm, fuzzy feeling inside me. I'm ready.
The End of Music - By: D. Newton, 28 Mar 2007 I will cut to the chase here - `F#A#ooXxx' is a fractured, flawed, apocalyptic album of outstanding reach & vision.
Yes, it lacks cohesion, the beginning & end of three long tracks here seem quite arbitrary, but I believe this to be the whole point of the record. The cover photo gives a massive clue as to what you can expect - a blurred, desolate roadside snap taken on the move - for this album takes the listener on a journey through multiple segments of sound just like a long road trip through ever-changing countryside, towns & cities.
And what a selection of sounds they are. One after another come spoken word samples, a haunting late-night train, delicate melodies & full blasts of the band's unique guitar-driven `orchestral' sound. The highlight of the record is `East Hastings' the post-apocalyptic power & cinematic scope of which was used so effectivelyin the film '28 Days Later' as the camera pans over a deserted London.
The diversity of sound is so dizzying that admittedly listening to the whole albumin one sitting is an emotionally draining experience. The mood is unremittingly bleak. Towards the end the quality drops a little & some of the idiosyncracies jar somewhat, for example the long, pointless pause before the final piece.
However, to summarise, this record delivers a unique listening experience. Sometimes when I listen to this I think this is what the end of music may sound like, & that is a compliment. An extraordinary achievement for a debut album & a broken landmarkin modern music.
