A Place to Bury Strangers

Oliver Ackermann fronts the endeavor A Place to Bury Strangers, which fuses shoegaze, space rock, and additional styles into fiercely intense yet frequently gorgeous sounds. Lineup turnover proved constant, yet APTBS sustained their focus on extreme volume, effects-pedal textures, and a brooding stance while shifting from the traditional shoegaze approach of the self-titled 2007 debut toward the sonic and electronic explorations heard on Transfixiation in 2015 and Pinned in 2018. Entering the 2020s, the group revisited their origins in noise, adding melodic touches on See Through You in 2022 before extending those qualities to immersive extremes on Synthesizer in 2024.

Although the collective traces its beginnings to 2002, momentum built once Ackermann, previously of Skywave, teamed with drummer Jason "Jay Space" Weilmeister and bassist Jonathan "Jono Mofo" Smith, both formerly of Mofo. This configuration of APTBS delivered its initial Brooklyn performance in 2003, adopting a darker, heavier, and more experimental stance than any prior work by the participants. The trio generated attention in 2006 via three self-released EPs and concerts that prompted acclaim as New York's loudest band. Killer Pimp issued the self-titled debut in 2007, documenting the group's sonic force in unfiltered form. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and Nine Inch Nails joined the subsequent touring cycle. Following an early 2009 agreement with Mute, APTBS refined its compositions ahead of Exploding Head that October.

Mofo exited in 2010, with Dion Lunadon assuming bass duties. Onwards to the Wall, the 2012 EP, steered APTBS toward a darker and louder sensibility echoing its earliest material. By the June arrival of the third album Worship, only the duo of Ackermann and Lunadon remained, handling all recording and production. Robi Gonzalez entered on drums later that year and debuted on record with Strange Moon in 2013, an EP devoted to covers of songs by the legendary Portland band Dead Moon. APTBS next collaborated with Serena Maneesh's Emil Nikolaisen at Norway's ABC Studios for Transfixiation, released in February 2015 as the band's first Dead Oceans outing and among its most cacophonous and wide-ranging albums. Gonzalez stepped away from touring, and Ceremony drummer and former Skywave member John Fedowitz filled the role for the Transfixiation dates.

Drummer/vocalist Lia Simon Braswell entered A Place to Bury Strangers ahead of Pinned in 2018, a streamlined collection highlighting electronic layers alongside vocal interplay between Ackermann and Braswell. Ackermann subsequently featured in the guitar effects pedal documentary The Pedal Movie, remixed Data Animal's single "Dead Raver," and prepared the Hologram EP, issued in July 2021 as the project's first release on Ackermann's Ded Strange label. That EP contained some of the noisiest music in years and included Fedowitz on bass with Sandra Fedowitz on drums. The same lineup sustained the loud yet melodic direction on the full-length See Through You in February 2022. These members performed at events such as 2023's Levitation Festival, documented on that year's Live at Levitation, and carried the same live intensity into Synthesizer. Released in October 2024, the album offered a raw, collaborative take on the band's sound, its vinyl edition containing a circuit board for constructing a synthesizer.