Math-rock wizards Battles are coming back this fall with the new LP Juice B Crypts, their follow-up to 2015’s La Di Da Di. The new album, Battles’ fourth, is their first since losing a member and becoming a duo. At this point, there are only two people left in Battles, but they’re both people worth caring about: The multi-instrumentalist Ian Williams, formerly of Don Caballero, and the drum monster John Stanier, formerly of Helmet.
On the new LP, Battles will have plenty of help. It’ll feature contributions from people like Tune-Yards, Shabazz Palaces, and former Yes frontman Jon Anderson. We’ve already posted the first single “Titanium 2 Step,” which features Liquid Liquid’s Sal Principato. And now Battles have also shared another joint, on which they team up with the R&B-influenced experimental musician Xenia Rubinos.
Actually, Rubinos is on two songs, but they’re programmed to run together as a continuous whole. Rubinos is on “A Loop So Nice…” and “They Played It Twice,” singing ecstatically over Battles warped, plinking, percussive electro-rock explosions. Like a great many Battles songs before it, the whole of “A Loop So Nice” is both euphoric and disorienting. Battles have shared both tracks in the same five-and-a-half minute YouTube video, and you can hear it below.
Juice B Crypts is out 10/18 on Warp.
Comments