Philadelphia Weekly

MUSIC

A Place To Bury Strangers

By Elliott Sharp

Add Comment | Comments: 1 | Posted Aug. 17, 2010

Photo by Jeff Wilson

It’s fun, even if a bit sadistic, to imagine what will happen when what has repeatedly been called NYC’s loudest band plays PW’s Concerts in the Park series at Rittenhouse Square: tourists uncontrollably dropping their $16 Parc cheeseburgers, $7,475 bottles of Château Cheval-Blanc cracking to bits at Barclay Prime, poorly constructed, overpriced condos shaking like jello from the earthquake-force of the ear-bloodying sonic boom. While so many have been ineptly compared to first-wave shoegazers like My Bloody Valentine and The Jesus & Mary Chain, A Place To Bury Strangers have the gloomy effects drenched atmospherics and in-the-red volume to plausibly wear the elite shoe. Frontman Oliver Ackermann also runs an effects pedal-design company called Death By Audio, and with names like Total Sonic Breakdown, Fuzz War and Interstellar Overdriver, the goal of these pedals is crystal clear. Magnetic Fields/Beat Happening-inspired locals the Homophones bring the calm before the storm.

Wed., Aug. 18
7pm
Free
With the Homophones
Rittenhouse Square
18th and Walnut sts