Like music to leave you with a 'wtf' look? Horse The Band are for you.
Every so often you come across a CD that is so bizarre you can't help but like it despite your distrust of a band who have generated the term "Nintendocore". Maybe it has something to do with the quaint artwork that looks like it should be pinned up in a nursery. Perhaps it's their name that doesn't quite convey the extent of Horse The Band's dementia. This isn't your average insane band. This is a band who are utterly in need of medical help if their music is anything to go by.
R. Borlax is the kind of nightmarish album that will only surface once in a blue moon. Twitching and shivering like a hideously bad trip, it begins with 'Seven Tentacles and Eight Flames' which despite its slow intro morphs a fast paced onslaught that twists and turns faster than the vocals can change direction. I'd be surprised to find anyone who knows what Nathan is screeching about. Straight out of California this is a band who are on a mission to burn their music directly onto the minds of as many people as they can. It's unlikely that this is a band who are going to be in the same league as Hatebreed, but they're no less worthy of your time. And who could resist all those references to the ever cool Nintendo found within 'Cutsman' alongside the kind of synth work you dream up whilst off your head on drugs?
From here, the demented, joyous angst continues into the bass driven 'In the Wake of the Bunt' which involves torturous shrieks grating against muscular drumming and on beyond the sinister beginning of 'Stabbers of the Knife, By Kenny Pelts'. The second half of this album is just as hectic as the first and just as packed with the kind of synth work to make you yearn for the games consoles of old.
The pounding movement of 'Bunnies' conveys the wicked lyrics effortlessly. Maybe at first listen it sounds like a simple, insane blend of twitching synths and raging vocals, but on closer inspection it is in fact a violent mood swing seemingly directed at the innocent rabbit. "Twitching bleeding screaming, bring the hammer down. Screaming bunnies bleeding bloody bunnies smeared across the ground!" shouts Nathan far, far beyond what people would describe as seeing red. Like the worst nightmares, their insanity continues further- 'The Immense Defecation of the Buntaluffigus' appears to be only a few seconds longer than its name but manages to pack in enough high speed guitarwork to make the final two songs totally unnecessary.
Horse The Band have certainly created a genre all of their own which, if you can stomach vocals with very little melody attached to them, is one that will bring a smile to your face. Much like a manic depressive, this is the kind of incoherent babbling you'll want to hear only if you're in the right mood.