Just how good are Battles live?  If you haven’t seen them do their sublime prog-math thing on stage by now, you must have been a hermit; I think they played about three thousand gigs in 2006.  They do the drummer centre-stage thing that Shellac - and probably some others, but I haven’t seen them - do, which works if you have a drummer as interesting to watch as Todd Trainer or John Stainer….those names…how odd….hmmm….anyway, Stainer has this thing that amuses me, a curious practice of suspending his cymbal six feet up in the air, and having to almost get out of his seat to smack it.  Maybe you have to be there.  Around his relentless rhythm the others are free to experiment, Tyondai Braxton in particular doing his dad proud (I’d hope) with his electronics, beatboxing and avant-fucking about.

And boy, have they experimented on Mirrored.  While the album opens and closes in the expected manner, with Stainer sounding like he is trying to smash his kit through the floor, some of the stuff in between is bonkers.  You have probably heard catchier-than-bird flu lead single “Atlas”, which sounds to me like a troupe of performing chipmunks covering Mudd and, having been roused from hibernation, the animals opt to stick around for the metallic dingbat “Ddiamondd”.  There is less getting into a groove and staying there than previously (nothing on Mirrored is as straightforward as the singularly angular riff of “Tras” from their B EP), Mirrored is more organic and improvisational, as if Battles were a modern - if decidedly less serious - This Heat.  Sometimes they’ll make odd choices, like the squidgy keyboard sound on the otherwise crunchy “Tij”, and I still can’t get with those chipmunk vocals, but for ambition, and for making me swat a six-foot high air cymbal, it can’t be faulted.

Have a listen to “Leyendecker” here.  It’ll be on sale here some time soon.