Sightings

***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.