“Horse …. The band? So are they called Horse, and you’re just specifying their a band just in case I get confused and think this crazy shit is made by a four legged animal or something? No? They’re actually called Horse The Band? What kind of a fucking name is that?”
NINTENDOCORE! This one (or two … or whatever) word is all you need to know about Horse The Band. Well, it’s not actually, but it’s a start. What do you get when you splice crazy stomping hardcore, a frankly mentally unstable vocalist, synth sounds pulled straight from old computer games, lyrical content about Megaman and such like, and an unlikely knack for hiding hundreds of tiny musical hooks in what, at first listen, sounds like sporadic hardcore nonsense?
‘R.Borlax’ is what you fucking get. And ‘R.Borlax’ is what you’ve been waiting for all your life’ OK, so I’m starting to sound a bit fanboy-esque here, but as far as concepts go, hardcore with midi sounds based on Nintendo is up there with Shockwave (every song about Transformers!) and Send More Paramedics on the ‘great musical ideas of the 21st century’.
Every song on here has something to grab you, even if a couple of the songs don’t quite work as whole songs. ‘Pol’s Voice’ has a Streets of Rage (Sega? Boo!) esque breakdown halfway through before completely spazzing out for 20 seconds and descending into moshable madness and then sliding into synth driven reflection. ‘Purple’ starts off with a frankly disturbing sample of two young lovers before going all Mars Volta-tribal drum-esque on you, but before you know it, the whole things melted into one crazy Blood Brothers style implosion. That’s without mentioning the short and sharp blast of aggression that is ‘The Immense Defecation Of The Buntaluffigus’ and opener ‘Seven Tentacles and Eight Flames’ which could be the theme to the final level of Contra at times, or As I Lay Dying if they regressed into their childhood at others.
However, the two major standouts on here are ‘Bunnies’ and ‘Cutsman’, which both manage to completely and utterly nail a perfect balance between spasmodic genius and a talent for song structure bordering on the ludicrous. The latter starts off with a sample from possible THE greatest film ever starring Fred Savage (which is a dubious honour, but an honour all the same) ‘The Wizard’ before erupting into a midi driven stomp which builds up to an almost orgasmic release on the chorus and the chant of ‘scissors on his head, SCISSORS ON HIS FUCKING HEAD!’ (Ref : Megaman baddie) and with a number of amazing guitar breakdowns and a brooding, mesmerising mosh part (CUT, CUT, CUT, CUT!) and ending with a pure 80’s keyboard line and the cheesiest quote from any film ever (The Wizard again).
‘Bunnies’ on the other hand begins with a delightful keyboard solo, the shout of ‘and people rise … again!’ and a crunching verse before yet another explosive melodic chorus. It then proceeds to continue for three and a half minutes without getting tired once. The bridge two minutes into the song is fantastic and the gut wrenching finale sounds like it could be ridiculous live.
Let’s just say that Horse The Band are almost like nothing you’ve heard before. They’re not entirely original, as they share the same approach to melody and structure as, say. Antioch Arrow, Daughters, or The Liars perhaps, but the song writing perspective, the perfectly balanced use of keyboards and the inherent insanity go a long way to make this one of the most invigorating albums I’ve ever heard.
“SMASH! Those fucking BUNNIES!!!!”
Ross
http://www.asssnake.com/horsetheband/
