Bury Your Dead is one of those New England hardcore bands that always puts on an energetic live show, conjuring mosh pits violent enough to pass for a rugby scrum. So Victory Records decided the best thing to do was to offer up a live disc: Alive, a CD/DVD combo of 12 brutal songs.
There’s just one big problem here. Bury Your Dead uses drum triggers and recordings, so while its live show packs a punch, it also sounds pretty much the same as the record. Live albums have inherently bad production. That makes the CD portion of Alive worthless — it sounds like you’re playing Cover Your Tracks through a boombox and listening to it three rooms away. But Alive isn’t a complete waste of time. Aside from killer packaging (the case unfolds into a coffin), the DVD is great. Not only do you get to see the insanity of a Bury Your Dead performance, but the “After the Show” portion reveals just how hardcore the band members are — we’re talking trips to the emergency room for stitches, compliments of a bass to the head. Besides, who doesn’t love lame backstage humor?
This article appears in Nov 9-15, 2005.