Botch - Unifying Themes Redux
Hydra Head
2006
Since I recently reviewed Botch's 061502, I thought I'd revisit Unifying Themes Redux, which Hydra Head reissued last year. Excursion originally put out the compilation in 2002; it collects tracks from out-of-print 7"s, EP's, compilations, and a radio live set. Odds-and-ends collections like this sound like a good idea, but in practice usually aren't so hot. That's sort of the case here.
If Botch was known for mathcore, Unifying Themes has lots of the "core," but little of the "math." Evidently, the band started out in a garage playing Helmet covers. While this disc thankfully spares us the fruits of such labors, it doesn't hold a candle to American Nervoso, much less We Are the Romans. In fact, I'd call some of this material flat-out "bad." Songs often drag on and don't know how to end; some simplistic riffing is borderline nu-metal.
A few diamonds pop up in the rough. People cite the covers of Carl Orff's "O Fortuna" and The B-52's "Rock Lobster," but both are novelties and wear thin fast. "Closure," however, has an eerie midsection that hints at future greatness. "Sudam" puts King Crimson on mid-'90s Touch and Go. "Frequenting Mass Transit" (which appears on 061502 as "Frequency Ass Bandit") sounds like Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir" courtesy of Don Caballero.
Despite the bumpy ride, a few constants are evident - Tim Latona's inventive drumming, replete with kick and snare rolls, and Brian Cook's unusual, prominent bass lines. No band starts out doing calculus; this disc finds Botch sliding by in algebra class, with occasional extra credit.
5 Comments:
I agree - Latona's drumming was about the only element that kept Botch's early material together.
What's so interesting about listening to Botch today is finding out how much everybody else in this math-core thing seems to have made it their sole artistic ambition to sound like them.
Seriously a huge number of completely interchangable bands sound exactly like We Are The Romans.
This isn't to say that that record isn't a good one, but sometimes a record's infuential significance sorta overpowers the actual merit of the songwriting and such. I can't enjoy it as much as I once used to simply of how oversaturated this type of "caustic" "discordant" "mathcore" later became.
Far it be for me to judge or deny people their reasons for making music, though. And to be fair, almost every band, due to the effect of sheer chaotic randomness that makes people as they are, no matter how hard they might try to totally emulate their favourites, ends up just a tad different and interesting in their own right. But gosh-darn if mathcore isn't the one genre where blending in with the crowd of Botchalikes isn't the easiest and worst fate that can befall you.
Oversaturation of an influence can diminish the impact of the original - Isis particularly comes to mind. However, I listened to We Are the Romans again a few days ago, and it still blew me away. The songwriting is so on-point and creative. Norma Jean may sound like Botch, but they've yet to make albums that sound like We Are the Romans.
Oh yea, everybody's afraid to like ISIS now. Same thing happened to Explosions in the Sky in the more pure post-rock field. Both bands (ISIS after Oceanic, admittedly) stuck to their guns while their guns became quickly the flavour of the week, and when the sound became too copied and tiring, they are now being told they're stagnating.
Perhaps ISIS should go the Botch route and retire while they're in they're still reasonably leading.
Unless Isis has the same writer's block/distracted by other projects problems Botch had, I think they've got some good records left in them yet. Their last album has some subtle refinements to their sound that keep them ahead of the pack, if not by much.
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