wiretapmusic

Rock bands tend to use dynamic shifts – quiet to loud/loud to quiet – in songs to create excitement and add dramatic effect to the music. Battlehooch seemed to have no time for dynamic shifting on Wednesday night; instead they put the accelerator to the floor and kept the intensity up for their entire set.

To begin the show, the six members of Battlehooch marched single file through the club banging on cowbells, drum sticks, tambourines and... an empty water jug? The noisy thumping clanging sounds morphed fluidly into the band's set when they reached the stage and picked up their instruments. The set ran nonstop from beginning to end and retained a feeling of looseness and communal joy throughout.

These six wildly dressed guys are a lot to take in. The guitarist takes up a chunk of the stage with his over-the-top rock moves and his jazzy garage rock riffs and melodies. Their keyboardist is like a wizard behind the glowing laptop screen, generating electronic noises and pounding out demented chords on the keyboard in his studded leather jacket and headband. Battlehooch's singer stands behind a small table of electronics knobs and uses an acoustic guitar, a portable TV, and a bullhorn while spraying joyful lyrics that sound something like Devendra Banhart. Beside him, the horn player provides a one-man wind section, playing three different saxophones and the flute. By the end of the set he was playing two horns at once.

Battlehooch's sound is a combination of garage and surf rock riffs and grooves, with some heavier stuff that sounds something like Led Zeppelin. They bounced musical ideas from one to another like the Fiery Furnaces, or even Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention. Parts changed one to the next with key changes that could have been the same song or another song altogether, you couldn't always tell. But it didn't matter because Battlehooch had the crowd in a frenzy and it was hard to resist.

[Jeff Bissell]

[STREAM] Battlehooch: Various Tracks