Battlestations – Battlestations

The debut album entitled “Battlestations,” is also by the band of the same name. Although being dubbed “post-rock, space rock, and all that”, I like to think of Battlestations as an experimental progressive post-rock band. While the songs may not have been as progressive as I would’ve liked, there are still plenty of prog flourishes. I had never really gotten into post-rock, but in all honesty I never really tried to. The long ambient passages didn’t really seem too exciting to me. However, Battlestations may have changed my opinion. The format of this album and songs are much different than a normal album, you wouldn’t generally have 3 songs with an average length of about 15 minutes. The album may be technically instrumental, but there are plenty of clips of people speaking.

From the first spoken passage in the beginning of No Survivors, it may or may not become clear what the songs are about. Even though I don’t concur with the lyrics, they are very mystifying. After a couple more positive ambient sections, the music takes a darker turn and remains that way for most of the rest of the song. Towards the end of the song drums start to fade in for a bit before fading out again giving way to a haunting piano melody.

The Taste of the Kill is the shortest song on the album, yet it weighs in at almost 8 minutes. Even after listening multiple times to the songs, I still do not get the name of the title. The majority of the song is a positive, peaceful ambient section with some narrative and chanting thrown in at the middle of the song.

Rounding up the album is Accident of Ideals, my personal favorite. A strong guitar line dominates the majority of the song with some nice choir harmony-esque sounds in the background. A very nice transition changes from positive guitar leads to a more bleak sound and a long spoken passage with some very haunting synths. A very weird voice, perhaps reversed or mixed up, ends Accident of Ideals.

Battlestations is a great album overall, especially being the first release of the band. The band is very musically complex; each member having mastery at his/her own instrument. The dark, desolate theme of the album melds with the music very well. While I may not agree with what the lyrics convey, they are very mysterious and may/may not require multiple listens to understand the concept. If new material from Battlestations comes my way, I will certainly grab it up. 8/10.