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Battlehooch

Monday, February 04 2008

Battlehooch reminds me of one of my favorite movies, Revenge of the Nerds. They're a bunch of band kids, guys who grew up studying music on trumpets, saxophones, flutes, and pianos, who hung on long enough to outlast the stereotypes. Now, having been embraced by the underground music community, they're leveling the scene with a sonic assault that feels like a caged animal let loose in a club full of jaded music snobs. No band wants to play after Battlehooch, because they tear through crowds, leaving audiences limp and giddy from the spastic dancing necessary to keep up with their music.

Battlehooch live truly is a physical experience. You will feel them, they will touch you in a tender and possibly uncomfortable way, and just when you think you've got a hang on the groove, the band whips the steering wheel and floors it in the other direction. Trying to dance to their incredibly dance-provoking music can be difficult, like dancing on a variable-speed carousel that also spins in different directions. You just have to throw your body into it and accept that you will get fooled when they point in one direction and then explode behind your back with a blast of funky horn-vocal harmonies over slamming, loose-limbed jazz drumming.

Musically, these guys are prog rockers. Battlehooch's musical starting point is miles beyond where a typical rock band even strives to be. You can hear it clearly on their self-recorded EP, Oof Owf, which has a professional sound quality that betrays some knob twisting genius inside the Republic of Battlehooch. Each of the four songs has a unique feel, from the zany introduction of “Boog Woogily,” with it sound effects like a Looney Tunes sound track, to the aggressive “Deep Knee Bends,” and the sheer power of “Irreconcilable Differences.” A homemade debut EP of this caliber is almost unprecedented, it shows a ton of promise for this band, and displays their self-sufficiency: they’re doing it themselves and getting professional results.

While Battlehooch is a congealed musical unit with a singular artistic vision, each individual seems to have a fully developed sense of his own playing and brings a unique personality and vigor to the music. For example, the lead singer is a sort of California nature boy, a thrift store lifer with a homemade hairdo, a moustache, and the far off gaze of one whose life is in the hands of the band. He is their spiritual leader. The guitarist's rock maneuvers come across as tongue-in-cheek at first, yet he plays with such joy it's like a nine-year old dancing in his bedroom with a brand new guitar that he hasn't yet learned to play. These moves are on top of his superb playing style that is fresh and original, yet full of classic rock and funk jams. The horn player is a wild man sending out sonic smoke signals and providing some of the music's most powerful lines with his saxophones and flute. Sometimes he evens plays two horns at once – seriously. His wildness is a driving force wailing like a siren and leading the band into a spacey territory on "Irreconcilable Differences." The rhythm section is tremendous; straightforward and funky, yet with a delicate melodic underpinning that helps the horn, guitar, piano, and vocal melodies really soar. The keyboardist seems to be either the evil genius or the heart of the band, or both. His style of free-form playing and sound effects tempered with just the right mix of subtlety seems like the personification of Battlehooch. He manipulates live sound, generates sound effects on the laptop, and plays some pretty hot chords that alternate between "inside" and "outside" tones that contribute to some of those jolting changes, and to the sheer power of their huge melodies.

Lyrically they bounce some pretty sharp wit around. In "Boog Woogily," they describe with humor a bungled romantic encounter that really doesn't satisfy. They shout against our military-obsessed culture, and question gender roles in "Deep Knee Bends," and when they try to be quiet on "When We're Trying to be Quiet," the abstract and wistful lyrics stretch a mellow haze across the stereo.

While the music community can sometimes feel overrun with myspace bands in this guitar-hero era, Battlehooch's exquisite playing and their blend of textures and influences is a refreshing reminder of why I love music.

[Jeff Bissell]

[STREAM] Battlehooch: Live at the Hemlock Tavern 02/07/08