There's a musical riot going on in Canada that doesn't rely on punk ranting, polemical rapping or, in fact, any vocals at all - for this is a "post-rock" riot. One of the sillier genre names to emerge in the 1990s, post-rock typically features guitar-based instrumentals lasting ten or 15 minutes, and band names of dubious virtue - the Silver Mt Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band, for example. The epicentre of the movement is Montreal's Constellation Records, a fiercely independent label that has a knack for producing music that will "make you weep for humanity's impending fate", as one reviewer put it.
Constellation's most notorious band, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, has not released anything since Yanqui UXO (2002), an album with a 23-minute song about the Palestinian intifada. The band's seriousness intimidates some, but its music ought to be heard by a wider audience. Many were introduced to Godspeed when the film director Danny Boyle used "East Hastings" for the incredible opening sequence of 28 Days Later. A perfect backdrop to the eeriness of a deserted London, the song is available to download at www.napster.com, along with the rest of Godspeed's epic debut, F#A# Infinity, at the usual rate per song.
But it is Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven (2000) that ought to be in the canon and on the A-level music syllabus: an hour and a half of apocalyptic orchestral music split into four movements of power and desolation. Godspeed has Shostakovich's knack for describing war and catastrophe in a sonic language all the band's own: the rolling drums sound like advancing armies and the sweeping strings like sobbing civilians. This album is also available from Napster.
Constellation's other torch-bearers worth investigation (samples are available at www.southern.net) include Do Make Say Think, a more relaxed and jazz-orientated group, and Re:, who make uber-experimental industrial music that ought to soundtrack Eisenstein films.
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