Antony And The Johnsons - Swanlights
- Written by Greg Salter
The title of Antony And The Johnsons’ new record, Swanlights, conjures up frail images – ghostly, birdlike beings; antimatter; pale, beautiful phantoms. It turns out to be the perfect encapsulation of this new set of songs – abstract, airy, fleeting, spiritual and graceful, they occupy a space that Antony Hegarty and his musicians haven’t so much carved out as ascended to. If Antony’s breakthrough record, 2005’s landmark I Am A Bird Now, also alluded to birds in its title, in retrospect it feels like a statement of hope or longing rather than fact. The songs dealt in physical matters – the body, the uncertainty of death, violence – it’s no coincidence that one song had the protagonist ‘spiralling’ downwards. Now, Swanlights feels like the pinnacle of a transcendental journey that began with 2009’s The Crying Light.
The album’s arrangements are certainly born out of Antony’s previous record’s minimalism. Restraint, balance and patience are certainly not qualities you’re likely to find in much popular music, but on Swanlights a solitary clarinet might weave in and out of a vocal line before dropping away again, or the string section may make to strike up, but barely make it over a wash of sound. That’s not to say, however, that the band doesn’t strike loose. More abstract passages return to Antony’s music on this record (the most famous example being the otherworldly latter part of ‘Hope There’s Someone’) where his voice merges with the noise of the other musicians. The manta-like ‘Everything Is New’ recalls his most famous song in this way. Still, there’s control even in these moments.
The elements of control, of restraint, in Antony’s music that has emerged over his last few records (since the outpouring of emotion and other voices on his first recordings) is crucial. Antony’s embraced the construction of another world through his music that, friends and interviewers have noted, is inseparable from his life and personality. It is of course natural for someone on the outside of society, in terms of sexuality, gender or anything else for that matter, to create their own world out of personal symbols, experiences and idols. If anything, on Swanlights, this world seems more personal and more distant than ever, with abstract lyrics and broader passages of music.
However, Antony’s voice remains in the centre, drawing you in. On ‘The Great White Ocean’, emerging from ‘Everything Is New’, he produces an instantly appealing melody, before allowing the song room to breathe. ‘Ghost’ tenses up, with a rolling piano and Antony’s trembling voice leaping like the subject of the song. It sounds masterfully groundless, without boundaries. ‘Swanlights’ is the centrepiece of the record, with its ghostly ambience and vocals multi-tracked, reversed and distorted to create a dynamic, constantly shifting piece that finally, after the halfway point, breaks open.
The second half of the record brings more immediately personal moments – the mournful reflection of ‘The Spirit Was Gone’ is as powerful as anything the band have ever produced, while ‘Thank You For Your Love’ (a bit of a red herring as a preview to the album) works as a moment of unhidden joy. The highest points are withheld to the end, however, even overshadowing ‘Fletta’, a duet with Bjork. ‘Salt Silver Oxygen’ begins delicately, before booming brass and bass crack underneath. Taken alongside the closing ‘Christina’s Farm’ it’s possible to discern themes of renewal, with religious images mingling with wildlife and natural settings. Antony repeats the words ‘everything is new’, as if to bring us back full circle.
It is possible then to hear Swanlights as a very personal plea for, or escape to, the other world that Antony has been striving for in his recordings from the start. Exquisitely controlled and intentionally not of this world, almost to the extent that it’s difficult to absorb properly at first, Swanlights doesn’t necessarily invite you in – it waits to be inhabited.