The Swans (43), one of the most significant bands of the 1980s, initially introduced themselves as New York's claustrophobic and paranoid alter- ego of Britain's gothic punk, but were largely the vehicle for Michael Gira's apocalyptic angst, Filth (1983), featuring two drums (Roli Mosimann and Jonathan Kane) and two basses, was the ideal soundtrack for mass suicides or nuclear holocausts.
Gira's agonizing roars echoed against a wall of sound as brutal as hardcore, as depressed as Joy Division, as strident as industrial music, as distorted as psychedelic-rock, as loud as heavy-metal.
The music on Cop (1984) was born at the intersection of a Kafka tale, a Freud treatise, a black hole, a medieval exorcism, the first wails of a robot and the last spasms of a serial killer on the electric chair.
Existential boredom exuded not only from Gira's (criminal, obscene and blasphemous) lyrics but also from Roli Mosimann's drumming and Norman Westberg's guitar noise.
Their gothic phase peaked with Young God (1985), a slow, austere, terrifying journey into Gira's sinister psyche.
The sound of the Swans changed dramatically when keyboardist and vocalist Jane Jarboe joined them.
The apocalypse began to clear up with Greed (1986) and was replaced by a new genesis on Holy Money (1986): Gira and Jarboe sculpted chamber/orchestral arrangements, martial tempos that evoked esoteric rituals, catacomb-like atmospheres and liturgic/medieval tones.