Reviews

Trapped in a dark hell between the garage and the dance club, Please Mr. Gravedigger throw down swirling keys and rough and tumble irony laden vocals. They know how to rock and roll, but with six members all contributing to the boogie, they aren’t as focused as a more streamlined group. Perhaps the lack of direction I ascribe to the band is due to the extreme brevity of this release, which doesn’t give them a chance to stretch out and find their footing. This EP only contains five short songs and an extended acoustic jam session that devolves into a bizzaro cover of NWA’s Fuck Tha Police.
 
Throw A Beat abounds in good moments, but it never fully congeals.  The first track is the most ‘all together,’ but it is less than a minute long.  Please Mr. Gravedigger even mix it up with some female vox on Seventeen Year Old Piece Of Gold with the assistance of Kelly Kotner, who also did guest indie screams on The Plot To Blow Up The Eiffel Tower’s most recent full length.  The Nine To Five has some great guitars lines over a rock steady beat, some keyboard meanderings, and vocal howlings ala Some Girls’ Wes Eisold that at times really fucking rocks.  But then they bust out into an extended guitar solo that kind of kills the erratic mood that had been shaken up.
 
This album is far from horrible, but it’s not perfect either.  It’s an interesting foray into that indie sound that the kids claim to love, but it needs a few more great lines ala Rocket Science’s terrific pleading refrain “Love me with the lights up” before Please Mr. Gravedigger can be counted amongst the elites.