I remember a Facebook group named something like “Since when did Indie Rock refer to pussies afraid of amps?” Here’s a band that should crush such beliefs. Oliver Ackerman and his band aren’t exactly afraid of amps. Just like their first album, this one is full of noise, distortion and fuzz on every level. Even the drums are distorted.
A Place To Bury Strangers is the kind of band that has a frontman who makes his own brand of fuzzpedals for a living, which means the album certainly contains a lot of fuzz and noise. But it’s not only a sea of noise, it’s also filled with post-punk you can dance to, more industrial songs, punk, shoegaze, shitgaze and whatever else you want it to be. While the “trend” in noise music the last years has been to spice up pop songs with layer upon layer of noise, the songs on this album are more post-punk and industrial. The soundscape is colder, and they sound more sophisticated than fellow noisemakers No Age, Wavvves and Times New Viking. They are also much rawer, maybe not in sound, but in form. They play harder, more serious and tougher music. You could say they’re the 00’s equivalent of The Jesus and Mary Chain, or maybe The Stooges.
A Place To Bury Strangers are from New York and their music is often refered to as “Shitgaze”, but as I said, they are a bit more sophisticated and tougher than bands like No Age, Times New Viking, Oxford Collapse, The Pains Of Being Pure at Heart, The Manhattan Love Suicides and Wavvves. They’re a bit like Sonic Youth in late eighties, early ninetees, Jesus and the Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, Big Black, maybe Ride, but also Joy Division and Pere Ubu. That means noisy guitar, drone parts, but also structured songs with cool riffs and good melodies.
The songs are maybe structured, but I am still fascinated at how Ackerman manages to get such a raw, desperate and dirty guitar sound that eats up all other sound. I guess it has something to do with playing god damn insanely loud. I don’t think I want to live next to where they rehearse.When they played at Øya in 2008, their show was the loudest at the whole festival. I didn’t wear ear protection, and for a second I actually thought my ears were starting to bleed. I also saw he was using at least twenty pedals, which is probably the reason why he gets that extremely distorted and dirty sound.
Even if their music’s noisy, the songs and riffs are catchy, like in the song “Dead Beat,” but it can also be darker and full of drones. It’s never boring though, thanks to frenetic and raw drums and a dirty bass that tie the raw guitar layers together. Dynamics are also very important here. They can go from low and silent (though never peaceful) to something that’s very close to complete white noise. The ending track, “I lived my life to stand in the shadow of your heart” is a good example of that. Starting up with a heavy post-punk/joy division/hardcore bass riff before the drums and guitar come in. Straight structure before the droning middlepart where the bass keeps on going, while you can hear lonely guitar feedback over the bass. It continues and continues, until the drums suprisingly come in and I believe Oliver Ackerman destroys his guitar, beating it to the floor. The white noise eats up the mix, but underneath, you still can hear the bass.
I think “I Lived My Life To Stand In The Shadow Of Your Heart” is a good representation of why I really like this record, and A Place To Bury Strangers. You have parts filled with chaotic noise, white noise, static noise, plain noise, but you always have the riffs and good songs underneath.