Bury The Sound
Autumn Magnets EP
Hidden Shoal Recordings

The Melbourne instrumental quartet Bury The Sound perform what can be labelled 'instrumental shoe gaze'. Here's their second EP, and their first record for the elegant label Hidden Shoal.

I was really pleased by Bury The Sound's (BTS) self released debut almost two years back. And, here's more of the same, dreamy stuff. BTS make soothing sounds for mind and body. Guitars and keyboards/pianos sweeps and glides in the air, with the bass and drums making accurate rhythm patterns to make sure everything's structured and kept together within the right limits. Their sound and music stretch towards cinematic landscapes. Think night time, big cities with slowly shifting city lights, half empty streets with lazy strolling night people. Think independent movies, think black and white. Imagine, say, Vincent Gallo driving a convertible, smoking cigarettes. He's driving around through the night, crisscrossing the city before speeding away to the outskirts of suburbia. Leaving a trail of cigarette butts.

BTS are related to instrumental rock done by those Canadian collectives or the Scottish lads (I'm in a 'try to avoid name-dropping' phase...). The three tracks are somewhat tied together, there's a red thread, even though they're quite different to each other. "What Would One Become" is the elegant opener, rising from a quiet start, going through various themes. For then to reach a more lively part, before landing. "Saratoga" is leaning on a bass pulse, being a stretched intermezzo. While the closing "Gemini Unbound" is the grand finale, with the music stretching for a crescendo before it descends. The latter is the stand out track on the EP, with its slow take off, before the song turns into more Mog..., eh, gremlin related rock action, speeding up and rising its intensity level. Without losing it to what might could become tempting noise cascades.

Autumn Magnets is a very fine EP. BTS have created a very clean and clear, rich and crisp sound, with instruments just fitting each other quite perfectly. The challenge will be (if/when) to come up with a long player with the same focus and quality.

Copyright © 2007 Håvard Oppøyen