Battles returned to Chicago last week to promote their new EP, Tonto. The collection of remixes is mostly of the track “Tonto,” from their full-length album Mirrored, which expanded the group’s electro-math-rock motif with synthesized vocals.
Their music has attracted a diverse group of fans, from music nerds to math nerds, and from trendy kids in skinny jeans to parents with babysitters waiting at home. They all stood shoulder to shoulder at Chicago’s Metro, trying to get a decent view of the stage.
Opening was Caribou, Dan Snaith’s melodic, percussion-heavy band. They played a mostly wordless set, but as with Battles, lyrics aren’t the point of the music — rhythm is. And to give percussion its due, Caribou put its drummer out front and turned a decades-long rock paradigm — drummers hiding behind guitarists — on its head.
As they played, a smoke machine blew swirling clouds that mingled with the lights, and a screen behind the band pulsated with geographic images. Despite a head bob here and a shoulder sway there, the crowd remained mostly still.
Then Battles took the stage. After roughly thirty minutes spent connecting laptops, effects pedals and knobs, keyboards, and other electronics, a buzzsaw guitar opened the set, soon to be joined by drums and a few extra layers of beats. The crowd began to dance to Battles’ music, which was energizing and exhilarating.
Seeing keyboardist/vocalist Tyondai Braxton tinker with pedals and buttons to make the odd vocal sounds of Mirrored was just as thrilling. Over the course of a song, he moved from guitar to keyboard and back. Through each number, Braxton and his bandmates — John Stanier on drums, Dave Konopka on bass, and Ian Williams on guitar and keyboards — looked as though they were enjoying the music as much as the crowd.
“Atlas,” Mirrored‘s second track and Battles’ first music video, was the climax of the evening. Everybody pulsated with excitement, and afterward, the place smelled of hot breath and hot bodies. That was when Braxton finally addressed the crowd, asking with a smile, “How’re you doing tonight, Chicago?”
– Lori Barrett
Battles: www.bttls.com
Warp Records: www.warprecords.com
Caribou: www.caribou.fm
Merge Records: www.mergerecords.com