Not to be confused with the Philadelphia act of the same name, Michigan’s Balboa — known to the rest of us as Balboa MI — are a five-piece sludge outfit slinging hate like monkeys throw poop. On their new EP, the grammatically incorrect New Means to a End (Eaten Alive Records), they blast their way through four tracks in under 15 minutes, offering a truer representation of the In the Name of Suffering aesthetic than most Eyehategod followers could dream of.

Like that album, New Means to a End has its roots in an evil cousin of punk and hardcore, twisted and molded by time into something more sinister. Balboa MI play their sludge fast (for the most part) and make no apologies about it. There are tempo shifts, both sudden and telegraphed, but their intensity and their fuck-all remain in tact throughout. Before I knew it, I’d been through the EP three times. “Wounds I’ve Sewn,” “New Means to a End,” “One Condom, Zero Hour” and “Black Lung” are each about as visceral as this genre gets, guitarists Justin Collard and Ray Nelson thickly riffing out while vocalist Jarrad Collard screams like a fucking madman across the proceedings.

Both John Cates’ bass and Chris “Cleetus” Wambold’s drums are firmly present in the mix, doing a lion’s share of the work of thickening these four songs out. It’s easy, perhaps because I’ve seen the band, to imagine them all headbanging and bumping into each other as they play these songs. Even if that’s the case and it is just because I’ve seen them, it’s a testament to the engineering job done by Kevin Kitchel, who taped the band live and the vocals later, that he managed to capture that raw energy in the recording. It’s a big part of what works best with Balboa MI, and without it, New Means to a End wouldn’t succeed nearly as well as it does.

While, like a lot of sludge, there’s hardly an emphasis on musicianship in the sense of showing off technical prowess here, it is worth noting that Balboa MI function with a remarkable tightness. New Means to a End, especially for having been recorded live, shows the band as knowing innately where they are in the song. Obviously the recording isn’t flawless, I’m sure there are blunders here and there and things the band would change if given the opportunity, but although it’s sloppy and full of feedback, underneath, the, the Collards, Nelson, Cates and Wambold have a strong sense of synchronicity that carries over in these four songs. Hope to hear more from them soon.

Balboa MI on MySpace

Tags: Balboa MI, Eaten Alive, Michigan, Sludge

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 16th, 2009 at 2:36 pm and is filed under Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.