A Place to Bury Strangers

What's going on at Myspace at the moment? Half the pages' players generate a "loading error" message, no songs anymore. Is it just me?

the review

They picked the wrong day for their myspace page to screw up.

These guys are awesome. I saw them play last week and they reminded me of the classic Jesus & Mary Chain shows that I saw (and the classic My Bloody Valentine shows that I never saw). Great stuff.

I can't remember if I'm supposed to be reviewing this for the AMG or not. I have a copy around.

THANKS FOR SHARING

Ned, I personally would love to see your take on this album.

I threw the album away when I got it. Looked and sounded like any number of local wack-as-hell post-ARE Weapons bands.

How the fuck can you call something "Best New Music" that was released on "Killer Pimp Records?" I half expect them to play the Continental.

Am I a bad music editor?

How the fuck can you call something "Best New Music" that was released on "Killer Pimp Records?"

No offense, but that question is 100 kinds of fucked-up.

Anecdotal Pitchfork Effect:
At eight this morning, I had never heard of this band. By eight-fifteeen, I had decided I would try to track it down and buy it this afternoon, making phone calls to record stores if necessary.

these guys are awesome. oliver used to be in a band around here (dc) called skywave, who rocked amazingly loud jamc-styled jams, but aptbs is about as loud and their songs are better. he's the dude behind death by audio pedals as well.

Is that related to the Death By Audio space in Brooklyn? That's a nice space.

hm, i don't know actually - oliver lives in brooklyn though so that would make sense.

yes he lives there. it's all in the pfork review.

killer pimp
http://galleries.lycos.co.uk/d/14985-2/ice-t-coco.jpg

except for taking the "jesus and mary chain"/"big black" sound to a new level of volume,treble and reverb ,(which is a good thing for it's own), whats so special about this band again?

w/r/t "killer pimp":

i'm dancing in my underwear to this right now!

Flying Saucer Attack were about 15 years early. They'd be on tour with The Shins by now if Distance had come out this summer.

Not a criticism of APTBS per se, just that 'noise pop' seems very in vogue all of a sudden. And ain't nobody better at it than The Goslings and The Angelic Process, anyway, to my ears.

OK, but, listening now, this is actually pretty good. Pretty really good.

record deal, book tour

(also, this band is great.)

this album is fucking great! a visceral melting pot of Unknown Pleasures/Closer moods, Psychocandy guitars, Atomizer drum(machine)s, and the best guitar noise this side of "You Made Me Realise" and "Silver Rocket."

I need to finally hear this thing. I've got it sitting around!

I like the sounds of this.

oh! and the bassline on track 8 reminds me a *LOT* of Pornography-era Cure.

They write great songs, but their production is really annoying to me. It hurts my ears - can't listen to it on headphones at all.

GET REAL
by miles davis

I definitely enjoy Sung Tongs, but the thing that gets me about all this Animal love is that it seems like nobody realizes these guys sound fucking WEIRD. Like so weird that I guarantee you that you, if you think they're great, will listen to them in five or ten years and wonder what you were thinking.
And I'll tell you what you were thinking. You were thinking: it's better for it to sound new than for it to sound good.
The production is abysmal. The singing is often grating. The compositions are strong. The guitar and percussion can be pretty amazing, though.
It's just not enough. If you want to listen to timeless weird, check out "Bitches Brew" and stop listening to music that sounds -- honestly -- like a bunch of kindergarteners on acid stuck in the middle of a black hole.

6:30 AM Wed September 12, 2007

shit, wrong thread :(

I like this thread because (a) it prompted me to give yet another listen to this band, who -- despite hurting my ears -- is pretty good and (b) I learned a new word; adulatory(obsequiously complimentary). But does Pitchfork have to be adulatory about any new band? It seems to me like a new band would have to be adulatory about Pitchfork.

I really like this band, too. I'm tempted to run their whole album through an EQ VST on the "rock" preset.

Heard the album, it's nice. Not raving happy yay about it but it ain't the BRMC, for which I am grateful.

Hah, BRMC...

*giggle*

ive seen them live and it was nice.
they are better on the long,jammy songs,than on the short ones,and the guitars were excellent.
there is though i think,a problem with the drum sound:
it is much clearer than the guitars and bass,which are shoegazingly blurry,
which makes a dissonance sound for the live set.

I don't hear much shoegaze in the guitars. I hear JAMC and Ministry and other 80s industrial music.

Maybe I'm hearing what I want to hear, tho.

no, you're right, it's more Psychocandy/Big Black to me than anything.

live they sound a bit different than on records (shoegazing/new wave sort of)

Shortest Record Deal Ever?

This album sounds great. Love the drums.

Agreed. I'm liking the album more and more (when my old ears can take it), and I am sort of "raving happy yay about it." It adds something to the 80s revival -- a genre that's now in it's "dying throes," I guess -- that I hadn't heard before (goth/industrial music), at least not in this way.

11/7/2007

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- still a really good album, too!

This album = still fucking great. One of my favorites from last year.

100% Agreed. A disappointing remix album turned up on eMusic recently. I'm eagerly awaiting some new material from this band.

ah yes, i think that "remix" thing was also a 7" limited pressing, or something. not really interested myself.

Yeah. I foolishly downloaded it, as I have 2000 extra eMusic downloads (from Circuit City cards) that I think have to be used by next March.

Curtis told me about this and I think it's the shit, that is all.

I really like "I Know I'll See you" but the rest I heard seemed a bit different and kinda generic JAMC clones.

New one sounds spectacular.

The cover of Love and Rockets' "The Light" on the tribute album sounded pretty good.

New one sounds spectacular.

How is it compared to the debut?

It does sound a lot more produced than the first one, but without being overproduced. The mix is a lot more precise, you can actually figure out exactly what's happening most of the time. It is also the loudest record I have heard in a while. It sounds really HUGE.
Two immediate favorite tracks : Keep Slipping Away & Everything Always Goes Wrong.

It is also the loudest record I have heard in a while. It sounds really HUGE.

My biggest concern with the new album would have been production, so I'm very glad to hear this. The first album sounds FANTASTIC when you crank it up -- nice and thick and tangibly ear-shatteringly loud.

Out October 6!

Have any of you seen them live? I saw them once in a small indie venue, and I was pressed right up against the stage so when the strobe lights came on Oliver almost whacked me in the face with his guitar. Good times! (Loud as fucking hell, too.)

Oh yes. Great live band.

i thought this thread was about a place to buy stranglers......

Oh yes. Great live band.

Live they're more shoegazey and less industrial-sounding, is that right?

There's a clip of them on Pitchfork.tv, I think, but I haven't opened it yet (I worry it will melt my eardrums).

This album is so pastiche-y it's unreal. I love the way that when they're doing the JaMC 'one' he sings like like Jim Reid and when they do the MBV 'one' he sings like Kevin Shields and when they do the Loop 'one' he sings like Hampson.

I mean, the guitars sound amazing on it and they're great live and everything but it's not really a patch on the new Atlas Sound album for shoey goodness.

Gooey shodness, shurely.

Anyway said pasticheyness means they're following in the fine tradition of those ultimate pastiche types of this style, Black Rebel Motorcycle Copyists.

they're following in the fine tradition of those ultimate pastiche types of this style, Black Rebel Motorcycle Copyists.

Ugh. That sounds like a terrible insult to A Place To Bury Strangers.

I do like APTBS but they really aren't all that far removed from said act. Maybe a little murkier...

this is all just britpop right? or is it something else? is it "indie" (uk definition pls.??

Neither, it's rock, or alternative rock or shoe gaze. Britpop songs don't have Brits singing in American accents and indie is a genre so lacking in clear definition it is mainly useless, but most current forms of indie include stuff like the "landfill" strain of pub rock/skiffle influenced garbage like Dirty Pretty Things or Razorlight and twee such as Los Camp!

The main touchstones of APTBS are Spacemen 3, Loop, Jesus and Mary Chain, MBV, The Cranes, Swervedriver . . . none of whom are indie.

And like Ned, I'm amazed how this band are getting a free pass by so many people. They're good but they are shameless, cynical and careerist copyists.

I don't think he said all that... (not that you're wrong. i don't really understand how that makes them careerist though)

They get a free pass from me cause I think their songs are good ! Which is a big difference with BRMC and other copyists imo.

And like Ned, I'm amazed how this band are getting a free pass by so many people. They're good but they are shameless, cynical and careerist copyists.

Um, hello, they're not getting a free pass from me.

I found them really quite boring, actually.

Dude makes nice guitar pedals, but I couldn't last a whole set, live. I think Shoegaze/Dronerock copyist bands have reached critical mass and started collapsing in on themselves at this point.

Sorry, the free pass thing wasn't aimed at anyone in particular on here. I mean people who I speak to on a daily basis.

Kevin Shields loves them apparently. I can sort of see that from a gear fetishist sort of perspective.

It's actually quite annoying that Shields often has quite... rubbitch taste in music these days.

I just don't get the APTBS love from a guitar tone POV. For someone who is such a great maker of pedals, dude has the most over-compressed terrible-80s-chorus tone to his guitar that I've ever heard.

Mind you, I've only seen them live, not listened to the record with any scrutiny.

The Place Bury Strangers guy used to custom build pedals for Shields so it's a bit of mutual love in.

Last thing I heard by these guys I think had a pretty tuff semi-industrial beat underneath it, almost like old Wax Trax or something... not that I really got into it but in this day and age I felt like that was enough of a twist to take them out of the realm of 'shameless copyists'

I was in two minds about them until I heard the album. Which admittedly I've only listened to once but on that listening I'll stand by that description.

Mind you, I've only seen them live, not listened to the record with any scrutiny.

Well there's your problem. The first record sounds great under scrutiny, and there's much more to it than a single overcompressed guitar tone. Lots of variety in the guitars, actually, and hardly overcompressed -- it sounds GREAT loud.

a pretty tuff semi-industrial beat underneath it, almost like old Wax Trax or something... in this day and age I felt like that was enough of a twist to take them out of the realm of 'shameless copyists'

Also, this is OTM.

'...shadow of your heart' *really* reminds me of 'didn't understand' by swirlies..

When I put Exploding Head on after not listening to it for a while, it melts my face off again like I'm hearing it for the first time. I love that.

They're about due for something new, right?

They better be.

Also recommend the Soft Moon album if you're jonesing.

Bailed on seeing these guys live last year cos everyone said it was REALLY FREAKING LOUD and my tinnitus is so bad now thats a dealbreaker kind of thing for me :( Kind of regret not going.

their records make me think they would suck utter balls live

i could see that kind of wall o noise being horrible if mixed badly.

My view is that their records are kind - very zeitgeist, hipster cool, with just a little more bite. When I first heard them, I wasn't feeling the JAMC by way of artless drum machiney pounding - wasn't there about 1000 groups trying the same thing circa 2007. Then I saw them and it was a revelation. The level of high decibel guitar violence with a drummer playing an augmented kit - it was like a totally different band.

I use their pedals and they are really good - the Soundwave Breakdown is true Holy Shit.

New record on the way, that last single seemed kind of tame, but we'll see.

'...shadow of your heart' *really* reminds me of 'didn't understand' by swirlies..

― iTote 2.0 (electricsound), Friday, January 22, 2010 12:28 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Oh shit! I had never checked out Exploding Head. I hear it though, listening now.

anyone seen these dudes live? Thinking about going to check them out & was just curious..

they were very loud. Fun time.

sounds like a fine endorsement to me!

Hows the new EP?

Pitchfork has a free download of a song. Sounds good.

I'm surprised Keep Slipping Away from the last record wasn't a hit. It sounds like one

i'm lukewarm on the records but this band rules live. loud as fuck, strobe lights, fog, by the end it was less songs than it was screeching noise and drums. srsly one of the best shows i've ever seen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7iG_s4PJM8

i will never not love this band.

Cool video. Makes me wish I still had my digital camera. I like textured stuff like that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyKKkEobRJs
I like how this is doing it. I have a gap of the 3 albums before synthesizer, what’s recommended