Full Album Premiere & Review: Borracho, Blurring the Lines of Reality
Posted in audiObelisk, Reviews on August 17th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
[Click play above to stream Borracho’s Blurring the Lines of Reality in full. Album is out tomorrow through Kozmik Artifactz.]
Borracho have never been a band with grandiose stylistic ambitions. They didn’t come out of the gate trying to blend math rock and Kyuss-influenced Polka. The mission has always been to play riff rock. They’re a riff rock band. They have riffs, those riffs rock, ergo riff rock. It is an admirable mission, and to-date has produced some righteous riff rock. And if I can add to that? Riff rock.
Blurring the Lines of Reality is the fifth full-length from the Washington D.C.-based trio — who’ve operated for the last decade-plus with the lineup of guitarist/vocalist Steve Fisher, bassist/backing vocalist Tim Martin, and drummer Mario Trubiano; one might argue producer Frank Marchand as a fourth member given how many of their recordings he’s helmed and/or mixed — and it complicates the above narrative from the outset of “Architects of Chaos I,” the first of a three-part side-consuming statement that starts with percussion, chimes, drums, and Eastern-tinged psychedelic fuzz guitar like some of the more recent Monster Magnet forays into grounded lysergics. It it not what somebody who knows the band might expect going in. The band, however, offer reassurance in the first lyrics: “Sit back, relax/We got you covered.”
What unfolds from there solidifies around a verse and chorus with a thoughtful political perspective — it might be summed up as ‘what the fuck?’ — that has been developing over time as an occasional thematic, as with “Holy Roller” from 2021’s Pound of Flesh (review here), “Overload” from 2016’s Atacama (review here), and so on, a punchy bridge and a return to the psych intro to lead fluidly into the gradually unfolding jam of layered guitar and mellow groove that starts the 11-minute “Architects of Chaos II.” The first of two inclusions over 10 minutes — the other is closer “Burning the Goddess” at 13:16 — continues the thread of Borracho finding new territory, as I don’t think they’ve ever sounded so patient on record before.
The build happens as they head toward four and a half minutes and they move into a fervent nod, crashes and a scorching, channel-swapping solo from Fisher that subsequently opens into a groove that would make Sasquatch proud and a first verse which begins past the halfway point of the song — I didn’t even know I gave bonus points for that, but I apparently do — and a continuation of the discourse from the track prior. There’s a riff thrown in around eight and a half minutes deep that’s a standout flash of Sabbathian swing, and from there, they roll it out with signature Borracho roll — the kind of groove you feel like could just go and go and go; it is a specialty of the house in their case — and an answer to that riff at the outset of “Architects II” with the opening of “Architects of Chaos III” and a cleaner, less throaty style of vocal than the band has ever had, echoing and riding that open-crashing progression, striking in the depth of atmosphere built up through the layers of guitar and bass, the steady push of the drums, a bit of throat-singing for good measure.
“Architects of Chaos III” cycles through again, with its twisting verse punctuated by the kick as it turns and seems to rear back and launch forward toward its sharp finish, concluding the first half of the six-song/45-minute album and letting the relatively brief instrumental jam “Loaded” take hold from scratch. An easy swing topped at first with languid lead lines turning to a solo in earnest, “Loaded” serves as a transition from one side of the LP to the next, with “This Great War” rolling from its first measure on a thickened, compressed-sounding riff that snaps on a snare hit to its nodder verse, bringing to mind Wo Fat with some cowbell from Trubiano as Fisher returns to the standard vocal style for the verse and chorus, an instrumental stretch under the solo rich in its fuzz and a welcoming rhythm that smooths back to a reprise of the first verse and a chorus to finish.
Both “This Great War” and “Burning the Goddess,” which follows with its own undulating movement and a deeper, harder shout from Fisher in the chorus, are less directly sociopolitical, but the latter uses its titular metaphor as an examination of human involvement in climate change — “Ashes to ashes and dust to dust/In the blink of an eye it all turns to rust” — and jams out a suitably bluesy solo to match — finishing with a return to the root structure of the song before breaking just before 11 minutes in to paired acoustic and electric guitar strum, the bass and drums kicking in shortly as a bed for a wistful, plotted lead that rides the fadeout into silence, Borracho having taken their methodology and applied it across the longest single track they’ve recorded to-date. Reaching new heights on several levels, then.
Of course, while Borracho are reaching out beyond where their past efforts have taken them, Blurring the Lines of Reality holds fast to much of what has always appealed about the band: the tones, the groove that emerges from their style of riffs, the songs and the sense that, of all the bands one might go see on a given evening, Borracho would be the one whose members most genuinely enjoy each other’s company. More than most acts, the members of Borracho come across as friends, and as locked in as they are here, the chemistry between Martin, Trubiano and Fisher is classic power trio and the band’s own, emergent from their years together and status as a veteran outfit.
But while one will recognize them through these songs and performances, the according truth is that Borracho have pushed the limits of their creative reach with these songs, in a variety of ways, while maintaining the crucial lack of pretense that has always typified their output. I’m not sure I agree with it all the way politically — I’m not sure I don’t — but there is an earnestness of purpose that underlies everything Borracho have done over the last 15 or so years, and fortunately that also shows up in Blurring the Lines of Reality. Not every band is interested in new ideas on their fifth record. That is a thing to be commended, even before you get to the actual accomplishments of the songwriting on display.
