Drum's Not Dead

iTunes Review

Relocated from NYC to Berlin, Liars have spent their short musical career in search of exile. They reject rock music’s standard rhythm section and linear verse-chorus-verse-chorus songwriting schematic, preferring to assault their audience with intensely physical, cinematically leaning concept sound collages (on the horror side) that simmer until boiling over in catharsis. Drum’s Not Dead is the trio’s third album and the concept here centers around two characters, Drum and Mount Heart Attack, representing opposing energies. According to the band’s notes, “Drum is assertive and productive,” while MHA is “the reaction to Drum’s action, the embodiment of stress and self-doubt.” Whether listeners ever ascertain such a specific story is doubtful, but what is readily discernible is how creepy an album this is. It closes with the near conventional “The Other Side of Mt. Heart Attack,” but all before it is pure havoc. The otherworldly weeping that sets the sonic bed of “Drum Gets a Glimpse,” the punishing industrial barrage underneath the maniacal chanting of “Drum and the Uncomfortable Can,” the distant dissonant hum of “To Hold You, Drum” that sounds like a witch hunt proceeding over the hill all make for a challenging listen that keeps its musical footing just firm enough to not scale back down this treacherous sonic mountain.