Review
Planning For Burial
Leaving

Are late passes allowed in the internet age where people get to hear the latest music from musicians as soon as 2 minutes (give or take due to their proficiency with certain computer skills) and almost always before the record is released anymore? Leaving sat in an envelope in my house for several months (while I feverishly searched for the package) due in part to my consistent Alzheimer moment or mental block concerning this particular album as well as the package being moved from my designated in box (yes I have one, the entire side of my desk in my office); when I finally found this package, I heaved a sigh of relief that I would not be buying a second copy (I had been mulling this eventuality over in my head for three weeks prior to finding it) and would at last get to hear this debut from Planning For Burial.

Essentially a one man project originating from the cesspit known as New Jersey (back off, I live here and am allowed to disparage this horrid den of corruption and general wickedness), Planning For Burial is a home recording outfit which eschews the slicker forms of high fidelity production (due to availability, convenience or aesthetic choice or none of these… take your pick); Leaving is the debut album from the one-piece.

The first couple of times that I spun Leaving, it refused to sink into my thick skull in the way that there was no immediate gratification; the album was certainly enjoyable (don’t get me wrong), but there was something about it that the clicking or aural intuitiveness just decided to not exist as the initial experiences happened. Who wants instant gratification all the time though (sometimes the best things like records are ones that you come back to months after first listening to it and just not being overly impressed)? Several weeks after these initial brushes with Planning For Burial, the indescribable urge to put the album on again began to eat at my subconscious; giving in to such compulsions are dice-y propositions, but I threw caution to the wind and put the album on again.

Allow me to say, that there are sometimes those strange instances when a song will seem familiar when you flat out know that you are the exact opposite in that regard and that feeling exists for me and this album, particularly the title track (its muffled drones sound otherworldly and disturbingly comforting at the exact same time) off of Leaving, which has literally played for entire afternoons on my headphones at work (yes, the whole afternoon, just that song, over and over again). What is the most arresting about the record is not that it is full of manageable and safe instrumentals (because it is not that in any shape or form) but rather that its variation and breadth is seamlessly interwoven into a cohesive whole; Planning For Burial becomes more distinct and intricate with each experience, and though you might think with a name like that and song titles such as “Memories You’ll Never Feel Again” and “Wearing Sadness And Regret Upon Our Faces”, Leaving is not overwhelmingly melancholic. The vocals tastefully augment the soaring drones and pleasant melodies, and the individual tracks always feel like they are just the right length and just the right placement.

The more that I listen to Leaving, the more that I want to listen to it and the more that I wish that there was able to hear more from Planning For Burial; it is the type of album that gets in you and makes you want to hear it without begging. A record certain to live on my stereo for quite a while, Leaving is an excellent work that should be heard; the question remains whether or not you will seek the album out and hear it.