Exploding Head is A Place To Bury Strangers' (Oliver Ackermann - vocals / guitar, Jono MOFO - bass and Jay Space - drums) second album release, the follow up to their eponymous debut. Exploding Head is 43 mesmerizing minutes of pain as pleasure. You'll be checking the levels on your living room stereo from the moment "It Is Nothing" pulls everyone in earshot through a vortex of groove-locked rhythms and back-spun power chords.
You'll be sucked in and blown away by the paranoid android pop of the album's first single "In Your Heart," the gorgeous gate-crashing melodies of "Keep Slipping Away," the Chinese water torture chords of "Lost Feeling," the sputtering percussion of "Everything Always Goes Wrong," the apocalypse now effects of "Ego Death," the sinewy, slightly sinister overtones of the title track, and the firework finale flare-ups of "I Lived My Life To Stand in the Shadow of Your Heart." This collection makes up the band's most arousing recording to date.
During the Exploding Head recording process engineer Andy Smith (Paul Simon, David Bowie) took the band to "a whole other level" says Ackermann. "I love the interplay and contrasts between something that's pretty and something that's scary," he explains. "Taking listeners to different places—even in one song—is so important, whether it makes them cry or pissed off. If you listen closely, some of the riffs on this record are actually like Ramones songs or '60s bubblegum pop."
The new album was recorded at Death By Audio, the rehearsal/recording/living space that Ackermann helped build and the headquarters of Ackermann's Death By Audio company - a customised guitar pedal manufacturer that counts U2, TV on the Radio and My Bloody Valentine as customers.
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