A Silver Mt. Zion – He Has Left Us Alone, But Shafts Of Light Sometimes Grace The Corner Of Our Rooms…

Absolutely stellar for a debut album. Elements of Godspeed are certainly here, yet Silver Mt. Zion has created their own style at the same time. Classical, rock, etc. are accurate genres to the album. It puts me in utter awe and sadness at points, but I think the track that really defined the album's purpose - being that it's a dedication to Efrim Menuck's sad ing of his dog Wanda - would be "13 Angels Standing Guard 'Round the Side of Your Bed". It's terribly depressing and it pretty much summarizes a pretty shit time in my life, which is why when I bought it at that point, I listened to the song over & over & over again. "He Has Left Us Alone..." is a beautiful album with many emotions that come with it. Listen and enjoy.

this thing came out around the last year of high school. i wasn't much of a social person then, although i was much more social than i am now. like a thousand other high school kids, 'slow riot for new zero kanada' had thoroughly kicked my ass into a sense of blistering awe. never had i heard anything as powerful....

so, i was, to say the least, eager to hear new material. this album did not disappoint. a silver mt. zion was, in many ways, originally a direct overflow of godspeed material. the band here is a shrunken version of everyone's favorite apocalyptic nonet, but shrunken only by personnel - the album actually adds a large amount of piano to the overall sound. we end up with something that is equally haunting, eerie and disturbing as early godspeed but considerably more dreamy. a few of the tracks have the rise/build thing going on but they aren't as pronounced as they are with godspeed. we are even treated to some very beautiful purely string music, with heavily processed guitars thrown in as a fifth string instrument beside the violins, violas, basses and cellos. we also have efrim's vocal debut here with a sad, angry rant about bankers and tear gas and what not....

like everything the godspeed entourage has produced, there is a level of humour here. however, it's so subtle that the vast majority of people miss it entirely. certainly, if you listen to the radio samples on the first track you hear pieces of satire with such phrases as "don't look it up yourself, i'll just read it to you". efrim's own lyrics, while presented in a brutally honest approach, have a likewise questionable integrity to them. it was this album that allowed me to piece together the thought that godspeed was more than anything else poking fun at doomsday millennium christians, all the while making a profit off of their confused and rebellious children. why did it never strike anyone else as a little odd that a band full of people with jewish names seems remarkably interested in the christian version of the apocalypse?

there is a level of brilliance in this, particularly as it seems to have gone on undetected. however, i urge you to listen carefully for it through all of their albums. if searching for it, it's really hard to miss.

musically, however, this is a very powerful record. although it is at times incredibly bleak, it is at times incredibly uplifting, and it's arranged almost like a symphony with a very small orchestra. there are layers of beethoven, layers of debussy, layers of stravinsky, layers of pink floyd, layers of arvo part and layers of noam chomsky. academically, it's minimalist. aesthetically, it's impressionist. emotionally, it's romanticist. however, at it's very basic it's still just punk rock.

an excellent album that you will appreciate if you enjoy the epic and the powerful, or if you want a heads up on what your grandchildren will study when it comes to late 20th century / early 21st century music.

A perfect release.
Strings, piano and minimal synths with very sporadic vox (there's only 1 track with vocals).
Absolutely gorgeous.

The best silver mt. zion there is and (so far i have found) there is nothing like it.
The term "post-rock" doesn't do it justice. neither does "ambient".
way better than any godspeed... or anything else for that matter. the only thing i can think of is "lush beauty". My 2nd favorite release of all time. I wish more musicians made note of it.

track five is heartbreakingly beautiful and sad. like whale music but made with instruments. a really gorgeous ambient post rock album, very dark. this band features of gospeed you black emperor. shame about the poncey band names and titles of tracks/albums cos the music is spot on.