Bury Your Dead
Mosh & Roll
By: Nick Habisch
Rating: 
The different forms of which music is presented, be it stage or studio recording, are sometimes a band’s blessing or curse. Bands like Attack Attack! May sound pretty solid on record, but be awful on stage, whereas a band like A Day To Remember isn’t that great in the studio, but is much more enjoyable live. This is the case for Bury Your Dead’s latest album Mosh & Roll.
Having been reunited with original vocalist Mat Bruso, Bury Your Dead’s 2011 release Mosh & Roll hints back to the bands early roots, combining lots of breakdowns with massive intensity in music and vocals. Instrumentally Bury Your Dead does nothing to separate themselves from the masses of other bands playing similar sounds; the guitars chug, the drums pummel away, and the vocals are relenting, and yet it works. This is a band bred for the live stage. Songs like “Slaughterhouse-Five”, “Jailbird”, and “Slapstick” seem like they were designed to incite moshing and crowd mayhem. The intro of “The Sirens of Titan” displays some melodic ability by the guitarists of Bury Your Dead, and the drumming throughout the whole of Mosh & Roll is impressive, if not almost tedious in it’s never-ending pace. The vocals rage, and are a welcome relief from the sounds of Bury Your Dead’s last vocalist.
Bury Your Dead is very much a band for those who enjoy this style of music. The casual listener will likely not derive anything from this album, and may voice that t is monotonous and repetitive, which it is, but it seems like Bury Your Dead would have it that way. They aim to play their style and hit you over the head with it until you succumb to the rhythm and violence. Honestly I’m at a loss as to how to rate this album. On one hand it is boring, repetitive, and really has no distinctive characteristics to separate it from other bands in this sound scope, and yet it’s groovy, angry, and would play out wonderfully in a live venue. If you’re an avid Bury Your Dead fan then don’t hesitate to pick up Mosh & Roll, but for everyone else, just go see them live instead.
