BATTLES - EP C – B EP

It was a fateful day in September 2002 when ex-Don Caballero and Storm & Stress man Ian Williams met another notable former bandmate, David Konopka, previously of Lynx, and a musician with a rather cumbersome surname, Tyondai Braxton.

The performance works, and they decide to bring in a permanent drummer. In a stroke of obvious genius, the choice falls on one John Stanier of the legendary Helmet. Renamed Battles, this "all-star" lineup makes its recorded debut in 2004, releasing two EPs in June ("Tras" and "EP C") and one in September ("B EP").

The three efforts (okay, there's also another EP full of remixes) by Battles are collected on this double CD with the wonderfully original title "EP C - B EP", released by Warp.

Let's start with the positives. First and foremost, this is a work built on classic math-rock momentum, though shot through with the electronic funk conjured up by Braxton and Williams. Stanier's drumming is less acrobatic than Fitzgerald's, but it blends well with the pair's analogue electronics. The best track on the whole double release is "SZ2", which brings together the band's two souls: the aforementioned funk for the first 5 minutes, with keyboards front and centre, and the more frenzied math-rock of the last 4, where Williams returns to guitar and the ex-Helmet man is free to drive the charge.

Equally fine are "B + T", minimal and repetitive (another key trait of the Battles sound), and the fully electric "TRAS2", with June of '44 lurking just around the corner.

There are essentially two problems: a sense of déjà-entendu, which crops up here sometimes to an exaggerated degree, and the repetitiveness of the tracks themselves. Déjà-entendu because it's hard to put out a math-rock record in 2006 and add anything to what's already been said. Sure, the analogue keyboards lend a prog-ish flavour, but in the long run that's not enough to shake off the impression. Add to that the various fully electronic experiments, like the lengthy "BTTLS" and the glitch version of "IPT2" ("IPT-2", sic...), which feel very much like filler, plus a certain repetitiveness within the double release itself, so that listening to "HI/LO" becomes a chore when the track itself wouldn't actually be so bad — and you get "EP C/B EP" as a whole: a work that, stripped of a few forgettable episodes, would have been far more appealing.

The extended-play format thus proves to suit Battles much better, at least going by what we've heard so far. Just one of the two EPs, whether "B EP" or "EP C", would have been more than enough.

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30/04/2026