silence kit #9

Battles
Mirrored [Warp, 2007]

Maybe I’m more apathetic to such matters but my friend made no bones about his slight annoyance at the exploitation of live loops and sampling techniques during Battles’ recent gig, one of the band’s several dates in Asia. (That and the fact that their performance was short by standards probably provided ample ammunition to critics.) As opposed to my friend’s quibble, I was just about completely sold on Battles’ metronomic swoon and their muscular instrumentals felt even more revelatory when performed live – or maybe that had something to do with the sight of Ian Williams and Tyondai Braxton trading guitars-and-keys melodic transmissions via alien lanes from each end of the stage. The root of all these excitable noise is assembled most uniformly on their debut Mirrored, a brilliant exposition of where electronic-jointed polyrhythmic pop can be taken when pushed ahead by wiry musicians that bring fire, power and discipline to the mix. While the visceral pulses of Mirrored are motored mainly by the forceful glam-metal stomp of drummer John Stanier, it is the other three multi-instrumentalists (Williams, Braxton and Dave Konopka) in the band who prove to be the more able consiglieres to their art-rock concoctions. “Atlas” erupts like a geyser of contortionist robotic funk while the unpredictable, busy-sounding trajectories of the album’s standout tracks like “Tonto” and “Tij” are at the same time peppered with unexpected nuances, the band constantly blurring the edges between computerized aids and pure musical virtuosity.