Battles – Mirrored
This review should have preceded that of Foals but that’s bound to happen since I’m not planning my posts at all. Battles are the American representatives of modern math rock (with Foals being the British ones). While Foals have a more indie sound, Battles are pushing the boundaries of experimental and progressive rock.Most of the songs in Mirrored (their debut album released back in 2007) are purely instrumental, with only a couple of them containing any lyrics (which in most cases don’t make much sense anyway). Their tracks are full of rim shots, repetitive guitar lines, drum beats, complex synth patterns and endless samples. If all this makes no sense to you, then you can just imagine some free-form experimental jazz sessions, only with guitars, drums, synths and chimpunk vocals all going mad.
To be honest, I’m starting to become a real fan of this new math rock scene and hope more bands come along and progress the style even further. I’m also really looking forward to seeing Battles in this year’s Roskilde (finally found another good band to attend during the festival…hopefully I’ll discover more before we get there) and from what I’ve read and seen from clips, they must really give an amazing show (their experimental style is well suited for unique gigs). This album gets my thumbs up but with a warning; their music is nowhere as popular as their counterparts Foals. If you’re not into progressive sounds it will most probably just irritate the hell out of you. But for those out there (care to believe that includes myself as well) seeking for something completely different, they are most definitely worth the time (and effort).
Atlas, Leyendecker and Race:out are my favorite tracks in an album that you cannot really separate tracks as singles, which actually makes a pretty good compliment.
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