Buried At Sea – Ghost

Living in the country of a rather small town you get the feeling that when you walk outside in the pitch dark, someone might be watching you while plotting a way to mercifully rip your limbs apart while you sleep beside your beautiful wife. On the other hand, living in the country of Arkansas can be somewhat soothing and tempting to just run around naked during the summer, spring or fall. See, now I feel like someone’s outside my window waiting for me to move so they can throw a brick at my head to knock me out and tie me up like a pig. Anyways, the reason I say all of this is because “Ghost”, the EP from Buried At Sea that was released back in 2007, can give you the same chills and spooks that normal ghosts or unknown wonders do. The only difference is that “Ghost” is a very haunting and tranquil EP that has one track lasting just under thirty minutes in length. Talk about making each track count, right?

As Sarah and I have talked in the past, I feel that no matter how long a record or single track is, I’m still going to feel the same about it at the end of the day. True, longer tracks give me more time to let it sink in like a disease and corrupt my brain into thinking it’s a bit more great since it’s length is in the double digits but when you actually listen to more doom, sludge and drone than anything else, that reason is thrown out the window. “Ghost” really does embody the life and death of the majority of doom, sludge and drone. The drone field is very open at this point and when Buried At Sea uses those ambient sounds that make my eyeballs widen, my muscles tighten and the air around me feel ten times colder, yeah I feel like the record has effected me quite a bit at that point. The sludge influence isn’t seen as much on this EP as in the past work they’ve done but when those sludge sections hit, they speak volumes and make God himself wish he wasn’t so high above the earth.

Now, the doom sections are pretty much what you’ll hear for the most part but even though this EP is nearly 5 years old, the sounds that blast through your speakers are still fresh, original and on the more honest side, tempting, just like a beautiful woman in nothing but fur, lounging around on your bed at the stoke of midnight. “Ghost”, for all it’s worth and golden moments, has just been one of those records that no matter what I’m going through, I can put on and enjoy every single chord that’s being played. In a weird way, I’ll even be brave enough to say “Ghost” is actually the sludge/doom/drone version of Dietrich Buxtehude, the German-Danish organist and composer of the 1630s. The work similarities are there for me but some might not see it, just trust me and pay attention to the track that’s linked as well as the track “Ghost”, in the preview.

Oh the flip side, Buried At Sea has to be one of the most underrated bands in all of metal, simply for the fact that I’ve never heard or seen many people mention them in anything. I could be wrong on this but “Ghost” literally covers ground in one track that most records can’t even do in a fifty or hour timespan. I’ll just be frank about the whole thing and stop “beating around the bush”, “Ghost” has to be one of the best records that I’ve ever let my ears hear. Am I putting it up on the shelf with the same work from Blut aus Nord, Electric Wizard and Sleep? Yes, I would say that “Ghost” is just as good as the records that those bands released. Simply for the fact that all the stars have lined up and the Gods that may dwell above or below have surrendered everything they love to just let this record grace their ears.

With that said, I can’t tell you what to do and I can’t make you listen to “Ghost” but I’ll tell you that if you don’t, maybe your grandmother will be disappointed in you and never speak to you again. Maybe next Christmas when she sees you she’ll wrap you up in her arms and whisper in your ear “Why didn’t you listen to “Ghost”? Now I’m going to rot in hell for being apart of your blasphemy.” I mean, do you want that? Do you want your lovely, cherished grandmother to hate you while you damned her to hell for not listen to a record for thirty minutes? It’s all up to you but I hope that you make the right decision because I love my grandmother and she loves me for listening to this record.

Listen to “Ghost” below:

Official Myspace. Official Metal-Archives. Official Last.fm. Unofficial Facebook. Download the record here.