Kevin Bronson on October 23rd, 2012

1

There’s something – no, there’s a lot – that’s weird and wonderful about the Burning of Rome’s debut “With Us,” an album of gleeful genre-mashing and subversive theatricality that might seem too oddball to take seriously if not for its sharp songcraft. The San Diego-bred quartet of singer-keyboardist Adam Traub, guitarist Joe Aguilar, keyboardist Aimee Jacobs and drummer Lee Williams will remind L.A. fans of Dante Vs. Zombies in their audacious approach to convention, which is to say they largely thumb their nose at it. The album, out last month on Surfdog Records, was co-produced by Tom Biller (Liars, Warpaint, Voxhaul Broadcast, et al), and Patrick Fogarty’s video for “Norman Bates” makes for a fine creep/peep show. Punk, goth, glam, psychedelic, showtune … whatever is fueling the Burning of Rome, it’s blazin’ good.

||| Download: “Ballad of an Onion Sprout”

||| Live: The Burning of Rome plays Wednesday at Los Globos.

||| Also: After the jump, check out the video for “Ballad of an Onion Sprout”: