BATTLES - LIVES

for those who don't know, battles is a math-y prog rock band, featuring ian williams from don caballero and some other dude who was the drummer from helmet. usually i shy away from the term 'prog rock' but battles is retardedly talented.

this album was a japanese only cd release in 2007, limited to 3500 copies. it has one studio recorded song, and the other four are live tracks.

some guy wrote a bit about battles live and it's way more pretentiously well written than i could ever dream of doing, so here's an excerpt of his review:

"They widen the sonic space even more live, replacing the glitchiness of Mirrored with cascading swells of thick, aquatic, warm, analog astral plane journeys. They are compositionally tight and otherworldly live, just like the best proggers were. Not only do Battles sound like the music that would be piped into the antennae of the Martian army in Vonnegut’s Sirens of Titan, but they dress the part of an extraterrestrial army by sporting nothing but the most immaculately ironed, matching, crisp white collar shirts. That, combined with the bizarre six-foot cymbal ex-Helmet drummer John Stainer crushes and Tyondai Braxton’s “throw your hands in the air” dance he does behind mountains of samplers, creates a visually strange and captivating show without reliance on video or light visuals."

dl.
listen[myspace]