The brainchild of American songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Thom Wasluck, Planning for Burial's gloomy experimental metal borrows from shoegaze, goth, and alt-rock as well as doom, drone, and black metal. A one-man band (both in the studio and live), Wasluck began operating under the pseudonym in 2005, releasing the first in a string of downcast LPs and splits pairing the ominous black shoegaze of Jesu with the doomy and obsessive industrial metal of Fragile-era Nine Inch Nails. After playing in several bands while growing up in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, he conceived of Planning for Burial as a solo act in 2005. Wasluck released Planning for Burial's debut album, Leaving, in 2009, and Enemies List Home Recordings reissued it a year later. The project built a following as Wasluck issued a steady stream of short releases, including two collaborations with Lonesummer on Music Ruins Lives and 2012's I Miss Our Conversations, I'm Sorry on Tycho Magnetic Anomalies. After signing with The Flenser, Planning for Burial released its second full-length album, Desideratum (which included a credit for "whiskey" alongside more traditional instruments), in 2014. Wasluck returned two years later with the single "As a Lover," and took inspiration from moving back into his childhood home for Planning for Burial's third album, 2017's Below the House. That same year, Wasluck issued Matawan: Collected Works 2010-2014, a compilation of out of print non-album tracks that he originally recorded in his former home of Matawan, New Jersey. ~ Heather Phares