- Critic Score
- Most active
- Publication
- Most clicked
-
100This is not just an album that can be appreciated by fans of the avant-garde, pop and rock alike but a genuine fuck you to the people claiming modern music has nowhere left to go.
-
100The way repeated listens allow its unobvious rhythmic and melodic logic to take root is fantastically rewarding.
-
100Battles unite process and expression, making playing that's as quantized and mechanical as Kraftwerk sound as wild and urgent as Albert Ayler.
-
91Mirrored is a breathtaking aesthetic left-turn that sounds less like rock circa 2007 than rock circa 2097, a world where Marshall stacks and micro-processing go hand in hand.
-
91They make heavy duty sound collages that rock, roll, and exemplify the increasingly small chasm between bliss and confusion. [#25, p.90]
-
90Powered by its fluid and seeming invincibility, Mirrored is almost frighteningly cosmic.
-
Whereas before in their career the four-piece seemingly tossed myriad elements about with little to no regard for the actual acceptability of the composition at hand, here each and every piece – pieces that truly do flow into one another quite magically – sinks into the listener's synapses silkily, short-circuiting them through disbelief rather than a simmering intolerance.
-
90If the Flaming Lips mated with Marilyn Manson and ate Underworld for breakfast, the end result might sound something like Battles' debut album, Mirrored.
-
90Every song on the 52-minute masterpiece builds and bridges until everything self-destructs and the only thing left to do is dance. [May 2007, p.92]
-
At times, the effect is akin to hearing Tortoise and Animal Collective covering the Steve Reich and Devo catalogs in tandem; but such reference points barely do justice to an album that just halfway through 2007, is already topping the year's best-of list in multiple genres. [Jun 2007, p.151]
-
Mirrored is a marvel, dastardly and wholly original as it is, and one of the year's finest.
-
90It's dance music that's hard to dance to and post rock music that's post what everyone else making post rock is doing. Oh yeah, and it's also one of the best releases of the year.
-
The indie-rock universe hasn't coughed up a record as rhythmically thrilling as Mirrored in ages.
-
It's easy enough just to drift off and let these tracks gently massage your eardrums like a hover of trained hummingbirds. But if you choose to look beneath the surface, each track audibly vibrates with ideas.
-
Mirrored is a focused, exhausting, and rewarding treasure. [Summer 2007, p.78]
-
Mirrored is Battles at their most experimental and their most immediate, their most wanky and most focused.
-
80Mirrored explodes with twisting grooves and obtuse angles. [Jun 2007, p.102]
-
80Worth catching. [Jun 2007, p.87]
-
80The outfit dispels any virtuoso vibe with their joyous absurdism. [Jun 2007, p.104]
-
Mirrored is unlike any recording out there at the moment. It's loud, funny, and astonishingly sophisticated, and doesn't feel pretentious in the least.
-
80Rock that's both fist-pumping and forward-looking. [Jun 2007, p.90]
-
80Where before they gave the distinct feel of a quick side-project for a bunch of talented musicians who were currently in other bands, on Mirrored it's clear that their hearts and souls are in every one of these songs.
-
While their sound might have progressed in an even more bizarre – if sadly less atmospheric – direction, it's still surprising, full of invention and totally unique.
-
80Some listeners may find the album samey or too similar but one aspect of Mirrored that can't be disputed is that it is a unique album with little to no similar peers.
-
80Even if you're not much of a cerebral-rock person, take a chance with this one-it pays off.
-
It works best when the songs sound in thrall to themselves, reacting in different ways while retracing steps, but it also fishtails into missteps ("Rainbow") that sound oddly like Mannheim Steamroller.
-
Give Mirrored a handful of listens and you might just enjoy having your brains splattered against your speakers.
-
Battles combine the power of hard rock with an experimental aesthetic.
-
There's nothing here that'll shock experimental music acolytes, but it might be a bit much for those expecting only brawny post-rock. Like Goldilocks, I find it just right.
-
Just when I'd made my peace with pop prog and begun to hope arty prog would prove another casualty of the age of digital instantaneity, these postrock warriors get the bright idea of adding tune and humor to their higher mathematics.
-
Elaborate time signatures and clever tape manipulations abound, and there's some fun trying to guess which instruments are synthesized and which are authentic, but Mirrored suffers from being too bright and spirited.
prev
next
Page:
- 1
User score distribution:
-
Positive: 82 out of 108
-
Mixed: 9 out of 108
-
Negative: 17 out of 108
-
David10One of the very best albums of 2007, this one needs several listens to yield its treasures. Hard to describe the sound, but it's truly great.
-
DaveF.8