Battles - B+T [MP3]

That’s what you get for splitting up a band like Helmet: the last level of musical development for the time being. Sounds unbelievable? Yes, so does the music. Drummist John Stainer fought his way out of the industrial battlefield, that was Helmet before they wisely decided to call it a day, and bewilderingly founded Battles, a smorgasbord of outbreaking outlaws, ruthless renegades and careless kamikazes. Others could call it a supergroup and they’d probably hit the mark better. For an appropriate illustration, simply imagine a multi-headed musical monster, that just munched a whole jazz-orchestra, some hardcore-heads and a lovingly retailed electronics power store and now insatiably lurches over the world’s stages.
When the opening track “SZ2″ all of a sudden transforms into a grooving substance, that occupies you like the notorious horror-slime in the splatter-oldie “The Blob”, when you stop counting all the instruments you think you can hear, when you don’t even realise that “BTTL” actually exceeds 12 minutes, then… well, then the Progrock-suspicion admittedly seems to become more and more justified. But the music just gets what it deserves and needs. Despite all their technical finesse, Battles don’t drown in musical masturbation. Redundant end in itself-solos reassuringly won’t be found. Definitely serves as a welcome bridge-over until Radiohead´s new brainchild is going to spit from miles above on all the skyscrapers of expectations. I might be wrong.