The Knife - Silent Shout (2006) vs. Fever Ray - S/T (2009)

oh come on you can't start a thread like this in AUGUST

literally unable to listen to either of these albums in the summer

You're right. But we had our first drizzle here in San Francisco this morning, so I felt inspired.

Blimey, they do such completely different things, though in remarkably similar spaces.

That Silent Shout is much more dancefloor/drone/relentless and Fever Ray is much more story/song/self-contained-world based. I probably listen to Silent Shout more, because it demands less attention (listening to Fever Ray is kind of like reading a book in that sense, that it's hard to do something else while listening to it) but that doesn't mean it's the better album.

Wow, this is a surprisingly hard decision.

It took my a long time to 'quite like' Silent Shout, but I enjoyed the Fever Ray album from the off.

silent shout, i think. the songwriting is more immediate and memorable, imo. not that fever ray lacks appeal. it's richer and more texturally compelling. i get lost in the spaces and sounds, but find that it doesn't leave nearly as strong an impression once it's passed. otoh, silent shout, perhaps as consequence of its pop accessibility, has seemed to lose a bit of its flavor over the years. fever ray hasn't. dang, this is harder than i thought...

Silent Shout - I never really got the hang of the Fever Ray for some reason.

x post. That's interesting, Mouthy. My guess is that most people reacted the opposite way, as they might've been anticipating something closer to a proper follow up to Silent Shout. That was my initial response to Fever Ray, anyway. I remember for the few several weeks of Fever Ray's release semi-dismissing it because it didn't sound as razor-sharp focused, memorable, singular, or startling as Silent Shout. I latched onto 'Concrete Walls' as an entry point, even though I considered it a lesser companion to something like 'The Captain' - because it had the trademark vocal manipulation cranked up to 11 (like most of Silent Shout). Then, little by little, I started adding one or two songs when I listened to Fever Ray - until one day, I realized just how whole and accomplished it was in its own implicit ways.

... And then, just when I've decided that Fever Ray is ultimately the better album - one that I expect to be listening to twenty years from now - I'll unexpectedly hear Neverland, or The Captain, or Like a Pen, or WSOMH, or Off to On, or any track off the album, and I immediately feel compelled to submit to its greatness.

I think I'd find the Fever Ray album more consistent these days although the highs on Silent Shout are higher*. I've never really liked Neverland or The Captain that much.

*Okay Keep The Streets Empty For Me is probably the best on either record.

The Captain is my favourite track on Silent Shout, and there are a lot of tunes on there that people tend to really like (We Share Our Mother's Help, Like A Pen) which I think are so-so. If I were to pick three songs from that record, they'd be Silent Shout, The Captain and One Hit - probably not the right choices according to most.

I like The Captain because it seems to be taking the sea nymph/banshee idea to its logical conclusion.

I think I agree with WCC and MDC on this, it's hard to choose b/c I go to Silent Shout for the higher highs and the pop rushes - the title track, Neverland, We Share Our Mothers' Health, Like A Pen - often listening to those tracks in isolation but on loop, in a way I rarely do with any given Fever Ray song, b/c I go to that album for the immersive back-to-front experience.

and I don't think either of those is a "better" way to relate to an album per se, so I don't know which to give the nod to.

I don't even care about Silent Shout beyond the singles but I'm still voting for it against the total bullshit that was Fever Ray.

The Captain is probably my favorite on Silent Shout as well. It's the deepest the Dreijers delve into the album's sonic universe, which is decidedly not a friendly, hospitable place - but it's just so stunning in its quartzose blackness.
I would agree that Keep the Streets Empty For Me is the best song, in a more traditional sense, on either of these albums. But I also have to give major praise to When I Grow Up. Its unresolved melody and enigmatic lyrics are complemented so convincingly by the precision and variation of the absolute first-rate production. It never loses any of its appeal and mystery to me because it evokes so many different images, thoughts, and emotions. And that bass, especially in its live incarnation, just puts you in a trance.

Reverend, huh?... Are you upset with it because it won the year-end poll for '09?

Lex, OTM.

Fever Ray, easy

Baffled by the idea that Fever Ray is "total bullshit".

I've always thought The Knife was okay, but Fever Ray lured me in from the very first moment I heard/saw her (that being the "When I Grow Up" video). It's kind of rare these days to come across a musical project that manages to create a totally idiosyncratic and enchanting world in both the sonics, lyrics, and visuals (i.e. their videos, gigs, record covers). Even though the influences are not hard to figure out once you think about it (Peter Gabriel and Björk in the music, David Lynch and Charles Burns in the visuals), it still feels she's managed to create something irresistibly new and unique. In my opinion this "world of its own" quality manages smooth out the flaws in the album (not all the melodies on it are that memorable, though there are plenty of catchy melodies, they're just often deployed in non-poppy ways) and make it one of the best of this century.

silent shout. no competition.

Might need to give Fever Ray another shot. The way people describe it here sounds right up my street.

silent shout easily

Tangential, but the Fever Ray show here might have been the single coolest concert I've ever seen.

That acceptance speech at the awards ceremony is one of the coolest, most bizarre, most memorable moments in recent music history IMO.

silent shout. no competition.

― Jamie_ATP, Wednesday, August 22, 2012 10:34 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Very, very few records from the past decade top Fever Ray, but Silent Shout is one of them.

oh come on you can't start a thread like this in AUGUST

literally unable to listen to either of these albums in the summer

― lex pretend, Wednesday, August 22, 2012 3:57 AM (7 hours ago)

As icy as these albums are, I got Silent Shout in the summertime so it's attached to that atmosphere for me.

I can play either of these albums regardless of the weather, but then again I'm a big mopey goth

no idea which one I'm picking; leaning towards Silent Shout just because it's longer

I like the Silent Shout CD better than the Fever Ray CD but that live Fever Ray recording which was distributed officially on some website or other (?) gave Silent Shout a run for its money.

Remixes of the Fever Ray album versus remixes of Silent Shout?

Coincidentally, Bengans.se sent out a mail today announcing that while the band's writing their fourth album (which is expected in the spring of 2013), the first three are being released on vinyl on Nov. 28th. Preorder links here:

http://www.bengans.se/campaigns/the-knife---album-pa-vinyl

I like both of these albums, but I listen to Fever Ray far more.

I loved Silent Shout, but I loooved Fever Ray.

Aaaah, I think when it comes down to what I still play the most, it's Silent Shout. This was an unbelievably hard choice.

It's basically all about the way the filters open out on the arpeggios on the title track and Forest Families, it just hooks my ears every time, it sounds so tight and yet so uncontrolled, like it could spin out into chaos at any moment.

They're totally different journeys. It's like comparing Kubrick movies. Silent Shout is 2001, It goes deeper and higher and draws on so many strands of life. Fever Ray is The Shining. It's focused, appears linear though isn't quite, and is filled with slightly unfathomable dread.
I marginally prefer 2001 and marginally prefer Silent Shout but I love them both dearly.

i think i'm more of a songs person and just feel those singles from Fever Ray are just unstoppable. i think i might like Silent Shout more as an album. this is really hard but going for Fever Ray.

despite hedging yesterday, i went with silent shout, no regrets. better singles, better ideas, more surprising and enjoyable as a front-to-back listening experience.

^ yep

This is a hard one. Silent Shout seemed mindblowing when I first heard it but I rarely listen to it anymore. Fever Ray didn't made quite the impact at first but it has aged better. It has a more limited palette of mood though.

I think you kind of sum up my feelings, contenderizer, yet... There is something I find so fulfilling about listening to Fever Ray. To follow the idea in Oblique's comment, I see Silent Shout as a super fucking sexy person that is very bright, charismatic, isn't afraid to say what's on their mind, has a great sense of humor, aloof, mysterious, and you just can't take your eyes off them. Fever Ray isn't as jawdropping, but very good-looking in a more earthy kind of way, keeps a lot of things to themselves, shy, but great to spend time with and draws you in with their subtle charm and intense, genuine personality...

Ok, silly analogy. But it is easy for me to see myself listening to Fever Ray for many years to come (which is not something I usually seek in music, actually). It doesn't shock me with its many moments of brilliance the way Silent Shout does, but I find it endlessly intriguing; it covers such a rich, introspective emotional range that it actually feels therapeutic to listen to it in its entirety.

I'm still undecided. I may just flip a coin.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

still worth a watch if you haven't seen it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymCP6zC_qJU

That acceptance 'speech' deserves to be remembered for a couple of generations. It's so concise yet there are so many things going on at once. It could be interpreted as ghoulish, comical, political, satirical,... Some YouTube comments suggest she's making a statement about acid attacks on women in Pakistan, but she could just be taking the piss. Or all of the above. Who knows. It perfectly straddles that line between an artist having conviction about their work and having a good sense of humor about it. And then there's the suggestion that it's not even KDA under that disguise, but a body double.

Although it gets tiring how nearly every female artist now gets compared to Lady Gaga - as if she were the gold standard of musical artistry - I must say that that Fever Ray stunt far exceeds anything I've seen Gaga attempt.

lady gaga fans are kind of the worst for thinking that

this was necessary http://www.theawl.com/2010/05/a-brief-rundown-of-pop-music-tropes-that-lady-gaga-did-not-invent

Mutter mutter mutter.

(This is stupid, but it gives me pause every time someone refers to "KDA", I have to remind myself they're not talking to a bizarro world me.)

But I think that one of the things I love most about KDA is that she does *not* spell anything out. Like, she credits her audience with the ability to interpret (or project) or draw meaning from ambiguous or mysterious works. There are some artist where you feel like they are constantly hammering home "But this is just an elaborate metaphor for XXXX... DO YOU SEE? DO YOU SEEEEE?" but KDA just puts it out there and explains nothing, which makes you feel like she trusts her listeners more.

Tomorrow in a year > Fever Ray > Silent Shout imo. I looove stuff like "The Captain" and "Silent Shout" but on the whole that record is sunk by 'not my taste' un-expansive production ("We share our mother's health"). I can't listen to it, that Nord sound is super cool on a spare track like "Na na na" or w/e but when they try to make it 'go bang' it doesn't work for me. Fever Ray is more up my alley and Tomorrow in a year is just an amazing, amazing sounding record. High expectations for next proper Knife album.

oni ayhun > fever ray

controversial opinions

Totally get what OP is saying there.

xp nah not really just personal ones. I never listened to olof's own stuff. Each record has been leaps and bounds beyond, sonically. long way away from the kitsch of "i'm in love with your brother" <3 that album too, yeah, but they're getting realer with every disc

i really liked deep cuts at the time but i can't listen to it now, it's just so inadequate in comparison to what they'd go on to do

The drum sound on Tomorrow In A Year is amazing. Scintillating.

I kind of feel like they're polishing down some of the quirkier rough edges while becoming better at their craft. That seems like an inevitability with most musicians, but it's a hard balance to strike without losing some of the uniqueness that made the music interesting to begin with. Luckily, with The Knife and related projects, there's a lot to draw on.

It could be that. An artist friend of mine who does little paintings and pastiche-y kind of stuff has been making some sales and doing pretty well. He got taken to a Big Art Collectors house who showed him some Big Works and sat him down and said "look, you know what you have to do, right? You know you're wasting your time on this small shit, right?" I'm not saying Big Works are for every day of the week or every musician and it was cool in 2005 to hear "Heartbeats" at every dance party but "Tomorrow in a year" is something big and serious and in every way as affecting as "The Drift" and I play the shit out of it. Really opened my ears re: digital synthesis, I could get specific but it'd be even more tedious. I hope they have some jams in their future sure but if they go for massively epic statements I will be the happiest.

I admittedly haven't listened to that project, but isn't it more of a collaboration with a slightly different intended audience? I tend to think of more purposed endeavors like that being things that fans of The Knife would pick up, but more casual listeners who have a Knife album or just listen to a few singles wouldn't look into. I'm probably in the former group, so I'm going to fix that problem shortly.

It partly is, but about the final third of it could just be taken as a straight new Knife record if you wanted to. It's an awesome thing whichever way, though.

I'm only three tracks in and this is amazing. No idea why I've missed it until now. I may have to pause and listen to it at home in a better, non-work setting.

SILENT FUCKING SHOUT

Silent shout x 10000

^^^^^

^

I'm curious to hear your elaboration on TIAY, OP. I think it's a fantastic record (it was my album of the year). It has a raw energy to it that their previous work doesn't have, and it captures the immensity of the natural world that Darwin was observing. My only slight reservation was that I think it wasn't all quite synthesized enough, actually. Silent Shout's sound palette may be too strict for some; I think it's one of its strengths. I think they crafted a very specific sound and explored it with great bravado. TIAY is much more unruly, as I think it should be given the subject matter, but I'm left with just a slight itch for something more refined. That said, I think it's a great step in their development as musicians and really look forward to their next outing.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

That's kind of the results I was expecting. As torn as I was, I pretty much knew it would be a landslide.

This poll inspired my choice at our record club this week.

http://devonrecordclub.wordpress.com/2012/09/06/fever-ray-fever-ray-round-34-nicks-choice/

And then this week's, too.

http://devonrecordclub.wordpress.com/2012/09/19/the-knife-silent-shout-round-35-nicks-choice/

This recent discussion and SM's blog has made me totally re-evaluate Fever Ray.

I'm convinced its reputation will continue to grow.