The Swan House was built in 1928 for Edward and Emily Inman, who had accumulated their wealth from cotton and investments in transportation, banking, and real estate. After their house in Ansley Park burned in 1924, the Inmans commissioned design of a new house on 28 acres in Buckhead. Sculpted and painted swans provide a recurring motif throughout the house and grounds, and the mansion's rear facade is sited at the top of a small hill with terraced gardens and a fountain cascading down the hillside. The grounds now host the Atlanta History Center, and the Swan House served as the Capitol for a party scene in the upcoming film The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and as both a backdrop and a character in the Quiet Hounds' performance Swans and Embers on the warm Atlanta evening of October 4, 2013.
The performance consisted of four acts in three locations on the Swan House grounds. Act 1, Cat In Ashes, began with an actor portraying an Inman family member from 1928. After some brief interaction by the actor with the audience, a female character, The Phoenix, was introduced, who symbolized the City of Atlanta from 1864, the year Sherman burned the city to the ground.
Quiet Hounds eventually took over the Swan House terrace at the top of a staircase and performed a brief four-song, acoustic set.
After Act 1, the band reassembled on the lawn at the bottom of the staircase for a brief brass-band number for Act 2, No One Alone, before marching down to the bottom of the hill where a stage was set up for Acts 3 and 4, Reconstruction and We Burn, We Rise, which were basically a Quiet Hounds' performance.
The Quiet Hounds' sound can be called classic indie rock, combining strummed, jangly guitars with harmonic vocals into rousing, anthemic songs, sort of like a less bombastic version of Arcade Fire. Whether or not they need all of the theatricality and dramatics that have come to accompany many of their recent performances is open to debate, but you can't blame a band for stretching a little bit and expanding their artistic boundaries. They are not a touring band and don't perform live all that often (I believe this is their first performance since a set at Athfest last June), so they make the most of each opportunity when they do.
The Swan House served as a stunning backdrop for their set, and they didn't project their sigil, Bat-Signal style, onto the house (top photo) until the last song of their set. The Inman and Phoenix characters made a brief appearance on stage toward the end of their set, possibly bridging Acts 3 and 4, but otherwise the band spent their time onstage doing what they do best - performing their intelligent and enjoyable songs, including a few new numbers thrown into the setlist for good measure.
They included a three-piece horn section to the band for this performance, which complimented their sound nicely.
The whole set wrapped up by around 10:00 pm. Quiet Hounds have perfected the art of transforming each of their performances into an event, and this one was no exception. No one, possibly including the band themselves, have any idea of what they'll do next or where they'll do it, and that only adds to the epic sense of the here and now that accompanies each of their performances.
