Let me introduce you to a dangerous musical world far beyond most of our ambitions to explore but, like the elusive northern lights, it’s worth experiencing because of its awe-inspiring glory. Imagine a guitar that soars like a majestic eagle through the ominous, rumbling thunder of drums and sickly green clouds that pour acidic vocals to the weathered ground below. The keyboard prances among fields of lava and sulfur as a fantastic unicorn with a bull’s temper for blood red and can shoot swarms of mutated killer bees out of its mouth when confronted with danger. The bass dwells underground as a viscous land worm that furiously propels itself to the surface just long enough to devour its prey with dagger teeth. This is a world that harnesses so much pulsing, brooding energy that it’s on the verge of imploding on itself in an apocalyptic fury.
This is the world of Nintendo Core brought to you by Horse the Band on the album R Borlax. Hailing from Southern California, Horse the Band is a group of five young, immensely talented musicians who have managed to create a new subgenre that only sparsely invokes comparisons to other musical styles. Horse the Band could be compared to At the Drive In, the Refused, Thrice, the Blood Brothers, and countless other bands that spew raw energy with every component of their music but, when it comes down to it, Horse the Band has a dynamic all its own.
They make a full-on energy assault, but they also play with the precision and ornate coordination of bands like Mars Volta or Dream Theatre. They also have a playfulness that’s mostly expressed by the pounding keyboards set to the timbre of your typical Nintendo epic. In the song “The Immense Defecation of Buntalliffigus,” the keyboards borrow thematic elements from the “Legend of Zelda” theme that tantalized our ears so many years ago.
The culmination of these influences is an over ambitious, preposterously brilliant album that will either send you screaming from the room, running through the streets calling to arms all those brave enough to battle the plague that could potentially destroy the world we have come to know and love, or it could send you into a delightful manic hysteria. I’ll admit, the first time my ears heard this music I threw my headphones off and began fearfully but curiously poking at the CD with a stick. However, after some careful listening, I realized that this album should not inspire fear for, although it may seem threatening, this alien artifact could teach some modern hard rock bands to have a sense of humor.
Although the album is brilliant, it’s not without its faults. For one, the vocals sound relentlessly angry with lyrics containing violent imagery. For example, the song “Cutsman” is about a retarded midget that wears scissors on his head and viciously cuts people to death. I won’t deny that this is a cool concept, but it’s probably one of the lighter songs on the album in a lyrical sense. Since there doesn’t appear to be a lyrical theme to the album, it would be nice to see the band take a more rounded approach to the vocals.
Additionally, the music is so consistent in tone and dynamic that it stagnates after a while. Luckily, the entire album only spans about 35 minutes, which accounts for its relentlessness, but the lack of flexibility prevents the album from seeming cohesive. There’s no natural development connecting the songs of the album to create a temporal significance. You could begin listening to R Borlax at any moment in the album and it wouldn’t hint at the location of the song within a greater context. It’s not a matter of poor sequencing because any deliberate changes in song placement wouldn’t affect the flow of the album.
Setting these faults aside, R Borlax is a difficult album that satisfies repeated listens. It suggests the potential for Horse the Band to flourish as an intelligent, funny group with an emotional punch. The album may suffer from a lack of cohesiveness and a tiresome tone, but the fact that music like this can emerge from the minds of today’s sun-drenched California youth is very exciting.
Grade: B
