Mission of Burma - The Obliterati

Genre rock Publisher Matador Records External Links Official Mission Of Burma Website Official Matador Records Website

I tried, okay? I listened to it several times. I thought that it might just be my pop blinkers operating at full effect; there had to be something I was missing.

But repeated listens just reinforced my initial prejudices to the latest by Boston's Mission of Burma. For example, "Let Yourself Go," employing Standard Indie-Rock Chorus #421 (collect the set!), makes me want to devote the rest of my life hunting down every member of every indie-rock band in the history of the planet and giving them a damn good slap. Shouting the title, churning guitars in the background. Business as usual.

And perhaps it's not fair to ask for excitement or invention from any random band, who have probably carved out a reasonable, and somewhat successful niche doing what they're doing. And I'm not expecting them to unleash Xenomania levels of creativity, but in The Obliterai's fifty minute runtime, it was hard for me to discern anything aside from a generic indie-rock mush. Having said that, "Nancy Reagan's Head" is a great name for a song. Just a shame that it doesn't quite live up its moniker, being yet another sub-Guided By Voices yell-a-long that goes nowhere and takes too long to do it.

So, Mission of Burma. I tried. And if you love indie-rock, then you'll probably get a lot more out of it that I did.