Music
Press
“A crew of local blue-collar roots rockers, filtered, distorted, and re-recorded to morph everything from acid folk to heartland rock. . . . This is one of the best albums of the year—anywhere.” - Positively Cleveland
“Each song is a loutish and lonely character, voiced by one of the two Cross brothers, whose gravely vocals sound somewhere between Ian Brown and Bon Scott, trading smokes and scotch.” - Cleveland Scene
“Is this the best [Coffinberry have]? If it is, that is a feat that deserves the utmost praise and respect and, if not, then I am finding God and repenting because I never saw something this good in Cleveland’s future.” - Dead Town Cleveland
"A guitar-rock melody maelstrom. . . . Coffinberry are workhorses, consistently performing and writing quality music in the same way the Rust Belt keeps your electric running." - Skyscraper Magazine
To be clear, this isn't a band who hop on hot genres, nor are they a band with an identity crisis. Rather, they're a group who refuse to let themselves become stagnant, adding and removing ingredients to their sound while never losing sight of the fact of who they are -- one of the Cleveland underground's signature rock bands. - I Rock Cleveland
"On this self-titled release, Coffinberry has actualized their sound, injecting some country reverb and lazy Lake Erie surfer vocals into the acid-rain rock of North Coast. . . .
Coffinberry is additional proof that there’s much more to Cleveland rock music than that Hall of Fame."
- Agit Reader
"There is nothing too complex about their music, but that’s what makes it really good. . . . This is seriously the next best thing out of Believeland."
- The Noise Is . . .
"The contrast between cold, hard machinery and pure human emotion is simply touching . . . their music nevertheless possesses a unique quality that allows for off-the-cuff humor and shrouded metaphors alike." - Performer Magazine
"The local Cleveland musicians surpassed my expectations and then some. It would be hard to lump them into just one or two genres but their music was just great and had a timeless quality to it." - Pop Wreckoning
"It was short, and it was loud, and it was melodic, with just the right splash of dissonance and feedback splattered about like a fun Jackson Pollock print." - Cool Cleveland
Discography
Coffinberry (s/t), 12" LP -- Collectible Escalators, 2009
God Dam Dogs, CD -- Morphius, 2007
Sleush, cassette -- Viva Recording Co., 2005
From Now On Now, CD EP -- Morphius, 2005
The Spins 7" -- Exit Stencil, 2002
Photos
Bio
“I’ve never really lived anywhere else,” allows Coffinberry drummer Tony Cross. “You can’t help but reflect whatever type of day-to-day life is going on. Cleveland is a unique place.”
Coffinberry’s self-titled new album (their third full length) delves deep into the basement aesthetic of capturing the kernel of inspiration where all the excitement lies, resulting in over a dozen largely acoustic, though no less over driven, cuts of sundrunk Midwest rock adorned by ghostly harmonies, ecstatic beats and melodies baked in an acrid lacquer.
The fourteen tracks (reportedly whittled down from forty) clock in at just thirty-seven minutes; each successive spin reveals yet another layer of melodicism within each two-and-a-half minute marble mouth incantation of fat rats, new colors and turning days into nights—revealing an album as varied as it is infectious.
The brothers Cross, bassist Pat O’Connor and guitarist Tony Janicek, along with the help of engineer Mike McDonald, have muscled out a splinter-edged slab of Midwestern Gothic that stakes claim to its own seat at the rock-and-roll table, even one that lies in the shadow of a monument. (-- written by Nathan Miller in Ghetto Blaster magazine)
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Benefiting from their previous studio experience (including time at Chicago’s Electrical Audio), the band retreated for months into the dimly lit basement of the house they occupy on the Cleveland/Lakewood border, to record dozens of new songs on modest tape equipment.
The resulting cut is an astonishing 14-song LP, its sound at once down-to-earth, detailed, and exuberant. Its workmanship points to Coffinberry’s dedication—and isolation: the bandmates live on a heavily trafficked yet anonymous roadway (a jumble of bars, car washes, and drive-thrus), an appropriate locale in which to create blue-collar narratives of sorrow and sanctuary. (-- label press release)
In 2008, the Cleveland Free Times arts weekly (now Scene) and its readers bestowed the “Best Indie/Underground Band” honor upon Coffinberry.
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