Pile

People have been recommending Pile to me for years. But Rick Maguire’s all-over-the-place vocals always made the Boston band sound to my ears like a weird hybrid of Neutral Milk Hotel and Jesus Lizard, which I wasn’t into. But recently, the foursome’s unique take on Radiohead’s “The Tourist” for the AV Club’s covers series, which turned the OK Computer closer into seasick slowcore, got me reconsidering. On Green and Gray, the seventh Pile LP, the noise-rock influence is still there — “The Soft Hands of Stephen Miller” (that would be the Trump aide, not singer of “The Joker”) updates The Jesus Lizard’s “Mouthbreather” for the current hellscape, while the thrashing “On a Bigger Screen” verges on cowpunk. But it’s in the dynamic arena where Green and Gray wows most. The opening one-two of “Firewood” and “Your Performance” lurches from eerie, anxious quiet to foundation-rattling heaviness (with much-improved vocals), and revels in the circuitous routes taken to get there. Chicago’s C.H.E.W. and locals Depression Breakfast will open. 8 p.m. at Drkmttr, 1111 Dickerson Pike CHARLIE ZAILLIAN