Sightings

Sightings

Michigan Haters

S-s Records

***RESISSUED ON VINYL!!! SIGHTINGS' live shows sure as hell aren't background music for a thrift-store fashion show. They bring the pain but good. Sightings‚ second album (first, Sightings and third, Absolutes are on Load), Michigan Haters captures the sonic abandon that makes their performances such a liberating mindfuck. This Brooklyn by way of Motown trio pounds out an abrasive skronk that at first comes off as a pure denial. The primitivist, lurching rhythms, shuddery basslines and trebly guitar slashes seem conceived to prove that Sightings is more punk than you, and you're just not meant to understand. But then, wait a second. You've been bruised, defeated, and suddenly you're floating in a river of psychedelic scree. Mark M. is yelping out some Lord of the Flies incantations. You can't pogo to it, but you can twitch all night. The violence of Michigan Haters flows in all directions; it destroys itself and the listener to reveal hidden conduits of sound, from the rubberized rumble of "Chili Dog" to the more bleached and angular "Guilty of Wrecking." It's a soundtrack for punching holes in walls and watching them bleed vital fluids. Sightings play noise that hasn't been defused by aesthetic noodling; they're not Sonic Youth and they don't want o be. Think DNA, Big Black, Keiji Haino if you have to think at all. Play it loud and watch the neighbors run for cover. Originally released in 2002 on Psych-O-Path.

Sightings

City Of Straw

Brah

***Crafting a lasting personal aesthetic in the midst of our ephemeral music culture is as rare as it is cause for celebration. With the release of City of Straw Brooklyn’s Sightings can be counted among the few contemporary bands who have forged a unique voice amongst the racket. Recorded over a number of months in 2009 at The Ocropolis (Oneida’s Brooklyn, NY studio), the band’s seventh studio album becomes the crucible from which their grandest and most coherent statement finally emerges. Sightings has never presented a particularly welcoming façade and their sui generis music has perhaps been passed over by less discerning listeners over the eleven years of their existence, but throughout this they have created a singular body of work appreciated and touted by the likes of Thurston Moore and Andrew WK. Sightings will insist (and we agree wholeheartedly) that at their core they are a rock band working within the context of pop song-craft. As bassist Richard Hoffman told us recently, “I think everyone in the band tries to remember the value of minimalism. Ultimately I think we try to write pop music, where there's no chaff and everything has a place.” With a deep reach beyond the spirit of their influence from greats like Birthday Party, Dead C and Jesus Lizard, City of Straw finds Sightings working at the peak of their creative powers and is the perfect re-introduction to one of New York’s most accomplished bands.