Nine minutes into 09-15-00 (Part 1), the violin riff that has been building so gracefully has reached a seat-gripping moment of poise - you're desperate for the riff to break and release the pent-up tension, yet can't bear the idea that it might stop. Then it breaks, unleashing Godspeed's familiarly complex layers of pummeling drums, rival string melodies, and controlled feedback. By contrast part 2 of this epic song pitches utter, abject bleakness, Chernobyl desolation against the preceding assault.

This is possibly the first time Godspeed have paired apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic sounds so perfectly, and certainly the first time they have given us a clear narrative reason for doing so: "09-15-00 is Ariel Sharon surrounded by 1,000 Israeli soldiers marching on Al-Haram Ash-Sharif & provoking another intifida" the record sleeve reads - it's the date of the latest resumption of conflict in Palestine. It’s mind-boggling to think about as you listen, and one in the eye for people who think that post-rock is produced by navel-gazers with no sense of ambition. It seems that Godspeed have tried to capture Holy War on record. Fuck.

After a (23 minute) start like that, Rockets Fall… is less imposing and less structured, the only steadiness coming from a funereal drum rhythm, while Motherfucker=Redeemer drifts from an unusually up-tempo beginning into a very brief but deeply unpleasant Pink Floyd-esque guitar section, and then out the other side. Maybe it's a joke. But this inconsistency isn't that isolated: Yanqui U.X.O. is a more complex, less cohesive album than 'Levez Vos…'. There's no spoken-word 'sewers are all muddied…'-type samples, much less of the quiet-loud-quiet-quiet-LOUD structure, and Godspeed have allowed their sound greater subtlety and range. If anything this is their 'Come On Die Young': more variety, more flaws, and generally more out on a limb.