Uniform Struggles to Make Peace with the Dead on New Single for Sacred Bones

NYC-based duo Uniform, aka former The Men member Ben Greenberg and York Factory Complaint's Michael Berdan, have signed to experimental imprint Sacred Bones for the forthcoming Ghosthouse EP. Today they've shared the searingly raw title track, which combines carefully defined full-body distortion with bittersweet melodies.

The band gave THUMP some backstory for the track via email. "The title is borrowed from Umberto Lenzi's 1988 supernatural schlock masterpiece of the same name, but like most tracks with borrowed titles in our current crop of songs the lyrics have nothing to do with the source material and instead focus on elements of lifelong battle with insomnia," they said. "Thematically, 'Ghosthouse' centers around the damaged relationship with a friend who has since passed away. It speaks from the perspective of someone who chronically wakes up in the middle of the night, lamenting whether or not they can ever make peace with the dead (hence the repeated lyric 'all the ghosts come out at night' could be taken somewhat literally)."

Berdan and Greenberg was also kind enough to answer some questions via email about their strategic use of intensity, their approach to songwriting, and their live show, which you can read below.

THUMP: How would you describe the feeling you'd like this music to evoke? There's an extreme intensity both in noise-tangential throb and melodic arrangement.
Berdan: It's a bit of a paradox. Structurally, the pulse is oppressive while the chord progression is somewhat digestible, almost pop-leaning. When we play this I feel physically disoriented. As far as wanting to evoke an emotion from a listener, I would like for that to be open ended. If someone finds an attachment to the melody that's wonderful, if someone else feels rattled by the waves that's good too.

You've described your approach to songwriting in this group as "templatized." Can you explain what you mean by that?
Greenberg: In the past I've always had a room full of bandmates playing various instruments, and the human element provided natural limitations on what a band could achieve sonically. Now it's just the two of us, with literally any sound we can conceive of at our fingertips, so there have to be some organizing principles otherwise we'll both go completely insane. At first we worked within the natural limitations of some fairly janky gear, and that was enough to keep us focused. Then I switched us over to sequencing everything in Pro Tools, and I spent a long time building up a unique sample library of our very own. Then I obsessively organized it into certain combinations of sounds that work for us, and sound like Uniform should. We've been able to expand our palette a ton, but I think it still feels like the same band.

What sorts of things do you have in mind for the live performances on your upcoming tour?
Berdan: Our setup is as minimal as we can make it. We fit a mixer and some auxiliary gear into a carry-on sized suitcase. We are a guitar, a voice, and the contents of this small case. We play as hard as we physically can. Our live performances are centered around our personal energy and a hefty degree of volume. With only two of us on stage there is a lot of room to cover. With such a minimal setup, neither one of us can afford to be passive when it comes to playing live.

Ghosthouse will be out on October 28.

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Correction: A previous version of this piece incorrectly stated that the interview questions were solely answered by Ben Greenberg, when he only answered one of them.