A Place to Bury Strangers

The free MP3s available online go back two years, but they show a band that's got a fantastic handle on the balance between sludgy noise and charming pop, unfortunately they don't seem to leave NYC that much nor do they update this website often.

 

A Place to Bury Strangers.com

A Place to Bury Strangers

This New York group either has a fondness of Jesus and Mary Chain and unpolished My Bloody Valentine or have such shitty recording gear that it all comes out sounding like this by accident.  I hope the former is the case and they continue to record songs with overdriven distortion and the verility of something that doesn't care what's in its path. "Don't Think Lover" is aggressive in a Big Black kind of way, with what could be a drum machine easily pushed to the limits of the noise side of the signal-to-noise ratio while "Missing You," perhaps a Slowdive nod, is far more varied in its valleys and peaks and a lot more energetic. The blazing sonic attacks in "My Weakness" echo of Ministry, but only if they were actually writing enjoyable stuff during their post-Twitch music, while the beats on "To Fix the Gash In Your Head" are so artificial but it makes the energy of the tune really fucking cool.  The more I listen to these songs the more I enjoy them. I hope this band continues on, progressing with their compositional abilities and maintain the minimal regard for cleanliness and sterility.