Battles - Mirrored (Review)

I'd heard so much about Battles. They're the toast of every webforum on, er, the web at the moment, including my board-of-choice, the one over at oink.me.uk, where there are approximately 10 threads made per second about the group and their new record, Mirrored. So, I gave it a listen. Based on other people's descriptions of the band alone, I was expecting to hear a noise rock record. In a way, it was, but not in the AIDS Wolf Lovvers LP sort of way that I had imagined.

Instead, I got a gorgeously intense piece of music. There's basically a typical band lineup here—bass, drums, guitar, vox—except that each member of the band also plays guitar on the record, and that the vocals are fed through the same sort of Chipmunks-reminiscent sort of pitch control that you'd usually hear on the chorus of a Classified song. It all makes for a fascinating stew of sound. The thing is, though, that for all its noisiness, Mirrored is remarkably smooth. In fact, to me, it listens in the same way that a Steve Vai or Joe Satriani record does.

That is to say that those playing are virtuousos. But don't make the mistake of thinking that Battles merely jam; there are songs here. The structures are challenging, but that's what makes the record unique. Hopefully, a few guitar heads will start listening to this for inspiration, instead of the emotionless shredfests that typically end up in such fans' CD players.

The only substantial drawback is that the second track sounds a lot like "The Beautiful People" by Marilyn Manson. The duh-duh-da-da-da-da drumbeat, all of it. Be warned. Otherwise, it's flawless.