Spires at Death By Audio

When you pick the same band name as a British hardcore band you have to put in a little extra effort to distinguish yourself. I guess that's why Spires have been playing every gig possible. I suggest you give 'em a listen on SoundCloud, though if you live in the area you can probably just catch them live on any random weekend...

Posted: 10/25/2013 at 6:00pm     Tags: CMJ  Death By Audio  Spires 

Pop.1280 at Death By Audio

As good as their booking and sound may be, Death By Audio is not one of my favorite places to take photos. The reason of course is the lighting, which is not only weak but pointed at everything but the band. Bands end up playing in the shadows. That's not the right look for a lot of them.

Lyrically at least, Pop.1280 are about the most nihilistic band in Brooklyn. They're well suited to the shadows. Hell, one of them was wearing dark glasses for a while there. Dark, yeah, it's their thing.

Posted: 8/4/2013 at 1:48pm     Tags: Death By Audio  Pop.1280 

Burnt Ones at Death By Audio

The fuzz-psych universe has both a happier, glowy light side and a mopey bummer of a dark side. Lately the dark side is getting all the attention, most obviously because of the unexpected new My Bloody Valentine album. Well, that has nothing to do with Burnt Ones. They are solidly on the light side with a more optimistic sound. Not that they're a straight-up hippie band but they get awfully close at times. At other times they rock out harder, approaching Nightmare Air territory but never quite so vicious. Think of them as a "good trip" psych band who want you to stare at the sky instead of your shoes.

Posted: 7/1/2013 at 7:35pm     Tags: Burnt Ones  Death By Audio 

Boring Portals at Death By Audio

Another band which fails to live up to its name. Boring Portals are not in fact the least bit boring. Nor are they portals, though fortunately I had no need for that as I brought an aperture or two of my own. They did however bring a rag doll (wtf?!)

Boring Portals are a garage rock band from Charleston. That may seem like a safe thing to say about them but it's actually a bit of a loaded claim. Bands have been known to start out as "garage" and end up going in a totally different direction. A band like this which is less than a year old just might sound totally different a year from now. Sure enough towards the end of their set (when everyone switched up instruments) the songs got a bit more experimental, maybe bringing out their VU influences a bit.

So perhaps I should say that Boring Portals are currently a garage rock band who have all of the energy and attitude and the occasional sloppiness which goes along being a good garage rock band. Here's hoping they play another gig in town soon! And that they don't sound like Kraftwerk by the time they get around to it.

Posted: 4/2/2013 at 10:51pm     Tags: Boring Portals  Death By Audio 

A Place To Bury Strangers at Death By Audio

On certain occasions "Death By Audio" refers not only to a music venue on South 2nd street but also to a legitimate concern for the attendees of said venue. This was one of those occasions.

See, Death By Audio is kind of a small venue, or at least the stage area is small. As a result everything seems more concentrated. The huge speakers are right nearby no matter where you stand so you can't avoid being immersed in the sound. Back when people smoked in there it was oppressive, you couldn't avoid it, it was everywhere. It gets so packed that you can barely move sometimes. This was one of those times.

Not only was A Place To Bury Strangers absolutely pummeling, as usual, but the visuals were incredible. Of course their light show has always been impressive, but what did I say about things were more concentrated? All of those projectors were crammed into a much smaller space than usual. Imagine someone scribbling with crayons right on your Occipital Cortex. Yeah, it was like that.

Thankfully the band used their smoke machine more sparingly than usual. Perhaps because someone remembered how lungs work? Thank you.

Posted: 12/16/2012 at 9:50pm     Tags: A Place To Bury Strangers  Death By Audio 

Grooms at Death By Audio

Okay, this isn't exactly the band Grooms. I guess their usual bassist couldn't make it so Jay of The Immaculates, full of the Christmas spirit (probably Jameson), donned a Santa hat and made it work.

Posted: 12/16/2012 at 7:29pm     Tags: Death By Audio  Grooms  Jay Heiselman 

Royal Baths at Death By Audio

Remember what I said about Death By Audio being too dark? These guys turned off some of the stage lights. Okay granted, the darkness did complement their heavy and hypnotic music. Sure made my job harder though!

Posted: 9/4/2011 at 5:20pm     Tags: approaching total darkness  Death By Audio  Lodro  Royal Baths