The weather on Saturday night in San Francisco was leaning on the side of foreboding by the late afternoon hours, with dark clouds ahead, scattered moments of showers and mist, and a vastly cold wind that was a stark contrast to the bright crispy winter days that the Bay Area had seen recently. By the time the sun dipped beneath the horizon on Saturday night, the cold and wet had amplified themselves and were coming to rest on a long line of people huddled together outside of the Warfield Theater. A large group of these people would brave the dry yet even colder evenings that followed at the Great American Music Hall. The weather was most appropriate for the mood and occasion, and for the band that was finally returning to San Francisco for the first time in over seven years: the Canadian post-rock octet known as Godspeed You! Black Emperor. Here were not the sunny glories of Sigur Rós, nor the numbing white noise of Mogwai; this was an experience that foretold the end of the world, the beginning of life, and everything in between, with eight musicians sounding like a symphony from worlds beyond.
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