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Borracho, Riffography: March of Time (and Riffs)

borracho riffography

Full disclosure, this past summer I was asked by Borracho to write the liner notes for this release. If you think that means there’s a conflict of interest in my covering Riffography on an editorial level, two things: First, I took no payment. Second, it’s more of an alignment of interest than a conflict, since if I wasn’t interested in them in the first place, I probably wouldn’t have done the liner notes and I wouldn’t be writing about Riffography again now. Still, if you think that means I can’t be impartial, well, impartiality is a myth and I write about the records I feel like writing about. Get over it.

I’ll admit I didn’t think much of Borracho around the time of the Washington, D.C.-based heavy rockers’ 2011 debut, Splitting Sky (review here). I’d heard significant hype about the then-four-piece (always a turnoff) and I found the album in need of a deeper-sounding mix and an editorial impulse. Promising “Repetitive Heavy Grooves” as a slogan, it delivered, but didn’t seem to have the dynamic behind it to stave off redundancy while riding its formidable grooves. Part of my issue as well was the gruff vocal approach of guitarist Noah Greenberg, who was too far forward ahead of his and Steve Fisher‘s guitars. I mention this only to emphasize the most underappreciated and undermentioned aspect of everything Borracho have done since Splitting Sky: their growth.

Now the trio of Fisher, bassist/backing vocalist Tim Martin and drummer Mario Trubiano, they’ve never put out a release that did not showcase marked progression from the one before it, and it’s precisely that story that Riffography (on Ripple Music) is telling as it marks a decade since their first outing, a split 7″ with Adam West the featured track from which, “Rectify,” opens here in suitably raw and rudimentary fashion. Cuts from Borracho‘s three to-date LPs — Splitting Sky, 2013’s Oculus (review here) and 2016’s Atacama (review here) — aren’t featured (one exception), but the narrative arc of Borracho‘s ongoing creative development is clearly represented nonetheless across a packed-in 13 tracks and 75 minutes of weighted riffs, nodding rollout and periodically driving thrust.

Key moments of transition — most notably the departure of Greenberg from the band following Splitting Sky and Fisher taking hold of the frontman role — are depicted, and between “Rectify” and early off-album pieces like “Mob Gathering,” “Circulos Concentricos,” and “Short Ride (When it’s Over),” the collection effectively sets up a timeline that ends with the three songs from Borracho‘s portion of the first installment of Ripple‘s The Second Coming of Heavy (review here) split series — a pivotal moment of arrival in 2015 — and their latest single, “Border Crossing” (premiered here).

The very nature of a release like Riffography is such that, in order to work, it needs to be honest on the level of “warts and all.” It’s true that in the years since Splitting Sky, Borracho have built and worked hard to maintain significant momentum when it comes to their stylistic maturation, the chemistry between Fisher, Martin and Trubiano and amassing an audience. As far as narratives go, theirs is cleaner than most.

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But still, Riffography tells the story from all sides, and while largely consistent on the basic level of their sound — the band has worked over the years on multiple occasions with producer Frank “The Punisher” Marchand — these songs aren’t without their bumps and/or bruises. Of particular note is a version of “Stockpile” with Greenberg still in the lineup. That track would appear on Oculus with Fisher on vocals, but it speaks directly to that essential transition in the group and to their trying to make it work as a foursome despite their original singer moving away.

And for what it’s worth, they seem to have learned lessons from their first LP in terms of finding a balanced approach. By the time they get into “Know My Name” from their 2014 split with Boston’s Cortez (review here), however, it’s Fisher up front, getting his footing as a singer and setting in motion a process still happening in building his confidence at the mic while also holding down the fuzz riffing that has helped earn the band such wide distinction throughout their time together.

“King’s Disease” from the 2015 split with Brooklyn’s Eggnogg (review here) follows and seems to return to an earlier rawness of approach with dry-sounding vocals, drums and guitar and bass tones, but works well to emphasize the classic-style swing Borracho honed as a three-piece and the way in which their “Repetitive Heavy Grooves” learned at that point to add engaging subtleties to go along with the forward march at their core.

And while I won’t take away from Oculus at all or the role that album played in establishing Borracho as the band they are today, it was their appearance on The Second Coming of Heavy that really solidified their presence and let listeners know who they were going to be. “Fight the Prophets,” “Superego” and “Shark Tank” remain a thick, rolling and satisfying listen — an EP unto themselves — and in light of the band’s to-date high-water mark in Atacama, one can hear the jammy aspects of that record taking shape in the solo sections of “Superego” and in the first half of “Shark Tank” as a precursor to the thrust that follows later.

It would be fair enough to leave the story there, but “Border Crossing,” which is shorter at 4:10, and a cover of Scorpions‘ “Animal Magnetism” originally intended for use on an unmaterialized tribute CD cap Riffography with perhaps a look forward at how Borracho will keep combining the various personality aspects that have emerged in their sound over time. No question Atacama was their greatest triumph to this point — and well it should be — but Riffography makes its point unarguably that Borracho are not now and have never been a band to hold still in their sonic take and not push themselves forward each time out. Accordingly, I’d no more expect their next long-player to rest on Atacama‘s laurels than I expected Atacama to stay in the realm of Oculus.

Further, if one wants to examine Riffography on a meta-level, in addition to summarizing Borracho‘s first decade together, it also serves to hold the momentum until that proverbial “next album” arrives, which again, is something they’ve always done so well. It might seem like a curio or a piece for fans more than casual listeners, but in both its exclusives and its gathered inclusions, Riffography puts due emphasis on how special a band Borracho have become over the last 10 years and reminds that their evolution is ongoing. For that, it is ultimately about their future nearly as much as their past.

Borracho, Riffography (2017)

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