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Rating: To listen to Ian Williams' guitar (Don Caballero, Storm & Stress), with its fleshy, irregular geometries, to enjoy a daredevil journey, broken and recomposed, twisted within the rigorous throbbing of impeccable drumming by John Stainer (Helmet, Tomahawk), you must buy a Warp record!
Inside, you’ll also find a bassist (David Konopka – Lynx) who proves to be up to the game and an unexpected "son of art," Tyondai Braxton, handling knobs and keyboards.
The old dear Warp (the stylish label that I, a distracted and occasional patron, continue to consider the home of electronic sound in recent years, but which attentive regulars tell me is increasingly versatile and omnivorous) releases in a double CD the three EPs, apparently the result of a single recording session, released in 2004 on the American market by this "battling" quartet. Which I have just discovered and of which I have become an instant fan. In the sense that I got it a couple of hours ago, this double CD, and I'm already recommending it to you.
There is the twist it develops, the wave it redraws, in the tracks that you can categorize under "new post rock."
But don't imagine bloodless desolations: a sometimes Fripp-like attitude emerges, which, however, gives up on saying everything, resorting to repetition and small deviations to indicate something, subtract it, bring it back, and have it spin in your head for a while.
And glimpses of possible future scenarios, when Braxton Jr.'s work makes space, apparently the right man in the right place, to celebrate the marriage between machines and the edgy, pulsating physicality of the other three.
But the guitar remains the heart of the record, its mathematical corporeality, the layering of circular riffs, in the hands of an increasingly eclectic Williams supported by drums that are a guarantee.
A work that puts into play fragments of interrupted conversations, seasoned with some flashes from the past balancing on new solutions. Leaving the door open to more than one hypothesis, all likely tasty, regarding the future of Battles.
And about their true debut album, which at this point I look forward to with curiosity, while I enjoy the succulent appetizer.
You, taste the abundant treats in the form of samples, if you like. And tell me what you think.
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