A loop is something destined to repeat itself until an opposing force stops it or gets in the way: a bump, a swipe, a cut, a flame. Godspeed You! Black Emperor's sound, their visual aesthetic — their very essence — seems indebted to repetition and the loop. And yet, from the outset, their philosophy and politics have raged against the destructive cycles that we, as a society, have resigned ourselves to: rampant industrialism and consumerism; environmental devastation; war and genocide, violence and hate and annihilation.
GY!BE have always been a monolithic anomaly, a critical and surprisingly commercial entity whose politics have always been front and centre on their albums and at their hypnotic, awe-inspiring live shows. Filled with projections, messages and noise, they are cacophonous and beautiful, often at the same time. Standing on a field or a stone floor or a carpet in any venue the world over, the force of their sound is felt in and through and by every fibre of one's being. It is an experience, one rooted in community, engagement, resistance and dissent.
The band is currently on a massive tour (one which they have concisely dubbed Godspeed You! Black Emperor on American Highway Beneath Setting Suns Thru the Liberation Autumn of '24) in support of their latest album, the transcendent No Title as of 13 February 2024 28,340 Dead.
The title, which refers to the reported number of Palestinian deaths by Israeli strikes between 7 October 2023 and 13 February 2024 during Israel's ongoing genocide, was accompanied by a semi-cryptic statement in which the band addressed not only the title, but the role of art in such trying, doom-laden times: "No Title = What gestures make sense while tiny bodies fall? What context? What broken melody? And then a tally and a date to mark a point on the line, the negative process, the growing pile."
This context loomed heavily on Tuesday night, as Godspeed You! Black Emperor returned to Toronto for the first time in over two years in support of No Title.
The night opened with Montreal producer Kee Avil, whose avant-industrial compositions were a proper, disconcerting start to the night. The minimalist set up — guitar, vocals, snare and an electronic drum kit with a multitude of samples — still sounded enormous, with Avil's ghostly, powerful vocals complementing the glitchy electronics and skittering, skeletal guitar lines. Her voice was immense, soaring and gnarling and cooing over the pulsating beats. This was noise you could very easily dance to, frightening in all the rhythmic ways.
At times, the sounds screeched and bleeped; at others, clicked and frayed. Discerning what was sampled and what was live became impossible, the sounds grinding and nudging each other while Avil intoned over it all through warped, piercing vocals. Drummer Kyle Hutchins triggered loops and sounds and played a snare like a singing bow, the hairs grating against metal, squealing and shimmering in equal measure. The confrontational repetition was practically SWANSian, while the electronic elements sounded like early Purity Ring if they hated you more — this is very much a compliment.
It was a nightmare, fuelled by gnashing teeth and relentless, crushing chords that crashed through the crumbling guitar tone. Avil didn't say a word to the audience throughout the 40-minute performance, except for at the end, when it was all but incomprehensible. But none of that matters: the end is clearly nigh, and when it comes, we'll all be listening to Kee Avil.
As the lights dimmed then settled into a muted, warm orange glow, a low rumbling tone started droning through the speakers. The instruments sat quiet on stage, the crowd silent save for some uncomfortable shuffling and unnecessary chatter. The silence went on and on. Then, Godspeed You! Black Emperor slowly began to take the stage, just a few members of the ensemble at first, a double bass and violin. There was a pensive cheer. It dissolved. Then, we began. The sound. Slowly, more and more members took the stage, joined the fray. They congregated. They played. The drone continued.
For the next two hours, notes trembled and wavered and crashed and quaked as the band led us through a world filled with fire and brimstone and body counts and God's pee (or was it Godspeed?). The Virgil to our Dante, we followed, entranced by the grotesqueries and beauty we were exposed to. The snarling, joyous noise, never defined by bravado, is a siege, and on a day as loaded as November 5, 2024, where the American election loomed large over everything, the obvious irony of listening to songs that antagonize the very nature of complicity and denial is not lost on the band and definitely shouldn't be lost on the audience.
Waves of droning, swooning distortion collided with the strings and robust drums (there were two full sets), the band bending and releasing, walking a tense razor's edge that never wavered, even in the lightest of moments. The visuals at a Godspeed show are almost as important as the majestic music. They tell stories and complement the music, offering images that feel both curated and random. At the back, the super-8mm films and loops (their choice medium for projection), hung in strips of anxious repose, awaiting their sacrificial turn in the projector. The intense percussive whirring of the projectors is itself an essential, inescapable element of any Godspeed show. It's practically a member of the band.
Nothing GY!BE does is simply aesthetic. Every image, every liner note, every title; it's all calculated and none of it is done simply to provoke or sneer. It's a battle cry of and for resistance, and when you make music this powerful, this exhausting, this significant, it has to be. There's no more room for subtlety or metaphor, and Godspeed is determined to impress upon the listener this feeling of perseverance, of need, of fight. People checked election results then quickly put their phones away. Their futility felt superimposed on the sounds coming from the stage, much like the images on screen: jellyfish, burning roses, abstract surreal snapshots, birds and clouds; nature imagery mixed with the abstract to form an impressionistic portrait of a burning world.
The band played most of No Title, including the expansive standouts "BABYS IN A THUNDERCLOUD" and "RAINDROPS CAST IN LEAD." Live, these songs took on a more urgent meaning, a new power. They are melodic, even playful at times, crescendoing harder and more robustly. They sounded immediate and frantic, exploding from the silence. The band showed themselves as the accomplished musicians they are, the songs unfolding in tight, energetic swathes. There is zero rock star pretension or posturing. Less than none, in fact. There isn't even a microphone on stage. Their unabashed maximalism is entirely unabated, transformative, impressionistic.
The songs seemed to blend into one elaborate piece, all drones and segues, riveting and subdued and cinematic. The cathartic push and pull dynamics of their music are given new life every time they play live: their albums are the pamphlets; the show is the protest.
There is clear reverence and respect for GY!BE, and throughout the night, there was minimal filming and photography. Instead, the audience surrendered to the din. They swooned and swayed and head-banged, but mostly they just stood there, staring straight ahead, transfixed by the anarchistic symphony unfolding in front of them. It was dizzying, overwhelming, hallucinatory even, an experience worthy of admiration and release.
Behind them, the projectors played on: silhouettes of planes, landscapes and highways, old films and scratched lines, men in suits and "progress" and newspapers and burning property and a billowing upside down American flag. It felt like they were on a mission, the dirge transforming into something profound, glorious.
The band ended their set with two older songs, which stood in sharp, dark contrast to the material from No Title: "First of the Last Glaciers" from G_d's Pee AT STATE'S END!, and the towering "Piss Crowns Are Trebled" from Asunder, Sweet and Other Distress.
As the instruments droned into infinity, the film strips were left in their respective devices, to burn, to melt, to crack, to blister and eventually to blacken into a hole. It was a beautiful, terrible, unsettling sight. Streaks of red and white and black towered over the audience, light barely poking through the sinewy strands, the film bubbling into a viscous, bleeding liquid; film as wound. It felt like crashing into oblivion then suddenly being saved, resurrected once more, the film trapped in the mechanism, burned by the same light that gives it life. It was a harrowing, beautiful metaphor, played out in real time. As both image and sound faded, the crowd, some looking quite shell shocked, headed for the exit, many unable to brave the noise any longer.
At some point at almost every GY!BE show, the super-8mm film flickers and clicks into place as a message, seemingly scrawled on the film itself, towers behind the band. Dancing to the beat of its own heart, it simply reads, "HOPE." At this show, "HOPE" appeared near the start of the show behind scratchy, flickering bars. It felt necessary to have it so close to the beginning: we all need it desperately and immediately. Eventually, "HOPE" was freed from behind its prison and remained on screen, wavering but triumphant, until it slowly faded away into darkness. Yet even in its absence, it continued to loom large over the proceedings.
Whether the world is falling apart or attempting to rebuild itself, Godspeed You! Black Emperor's discordant noise will always try to impart something positive. Not death or destruction or violence or blood or rubble or tiny bodies buried in the dust, but "HOPE." Leaving the venue, this was the message that must stay with all of us, meant to inspire and engulf us, even as the noise rings in our ears and whatever soul we may have left.