I wasn’t the biggest fan of Battles’ last effort Gloss Drop, but what I thought it lacked in variation and innovation might be made up for within the less rigid confines of a live show. There were wins and losses tonight but overall the real winner was my ass for getting to the Forum early and grabbing a booth; lordy was it too hot to be bothered standing up.
Early on, opening act Other Places broke the ice with their ‘pyoom-pyoom’ laseresque rise-and-fall electronic, before main support Witch Hats cracked a whip over everyone; they’ve turned their gloriously seedy dirge-punk into something a touch more digestible of late; that’s not to say their dirty, sneering Birthday Party-esque jolts and quakes were any less enjoyable in the past, there just seems to be more cohesion these days, and they seem less worried about treading more palatable paths sometimes, and the juxtaposition of sweet and sour works wonders. A strange act as a precursor to blippy shufflenauts Battles, but still a pretty pleasurable contrast.
The main question before Battles’ set was thus: with multi-instrumentalist-slash-vocal-alchemist Ty Braxton having departed, how were the remaining members going to adjust their on-stage multitasking? Especially for guitarist/keyboardist Ian Williams, it must be tough not being able to outsource some of that jazz anymore. His two upwardly slanted keyboards on either hand was a great touch to the aesthetics, and he was rocking a sample pad as well (don’t forget the guitar); despite the overload of responsibility he made it look like no thang all over again.
The other question for the night derived from Braxton’s absence in a more roundabout way as well; given all the guest vocalists on Gloss Drop, how were they going to pull those performances off? The answer was a simple vocal sampling effort combined with close-up facial shots on projectors of all missing artists. My Machines featured, in that vein, Gary Numan’s weirdo mug gracing too much of the stage for my liking, but it was probably the best live effort of the Gloss Drop stuff, which wasn’t surprising as it’s one of the stronger numbers on the album anyway.
Atlas was, I think, one of only two songs from last album Mirrored, and the children’s choir vocal samples made up for Braxton’s absence really well. The band only played Tonto for about two minutes before falling away into Ice Cream which I will make no secret of being pissed off about.
I say that mostly because it was kind of indicative of the group’s current inability to see a wicked groove through and have it flourish in as many exponentially awesome variations as possible. It’s for this reason that, fun though it all was, this current crop of tunes is indicative of a bit of a formative growth period for Battles. All the same they still hold their own; it’s not really fair that I analyse them only against their own capability all the time, but who else really hold a candle to ’em? Huh?
BY MATT PANAG
LOVED: The sound. Even an underwhelming show at the Forum tends to have blissful clarity.
HATED: The, bloody, not getting stuck into Tonto! And the bullying heat. It was just so hot.
DRANK: Coldstream yay!
