Don Caballaro: Gang Banged With A Headache, And Live [Album Review]

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Don Caballaro
Gang Banged With A Headache, And Live
Joyful Noise Recordings [2012]



Fire Note Says: The new Don Cab is intense, brutal, and also a great introduction to the Math Rock pioneers!

Album Review: Gang Banged With A Headache, And Live, is an ‘authorized bootleg” from Math/Instrumental Rock dynamos, Don Caballaro. This is one of those warts and all style recordings, capturing one show in Chicago from 2003, featuring a later incarnation of the band, Gene Doyle, Jeff Ellsworth, Jason Jouver, and Damon Che. There is an intensity captured on this album that one doesn’t find every day, this was an absolutely brutal live band, and Che was at the center of it all, driving the band from the drum stool.

The guitars are jagged, spiky and spiraling, the bass is a sledgehammer, and the drums are a chaotic maelstrom of sound and fury. Most of the songs start simple enough, a repeating guitar line that sets up a melody, and then all hell breaks loose as Che’s drums begin their assault. At times the band is doing all it can to keep up with him, there is absolutely the feeling that it could all come unglued at any moment, but the band is strong enough to keep it all together, and only ride that line. It’s not often that the drums are the main instrument of a band, but I kept thinking that over and over while I was listening to this album, Che is really a lead drummer.


The song titles are truly something to behold on this record, I find that the more interesting the song title is, the better the music is. Highlights include “In the Absence of Evidence to the Contrary, One May Step Out of the Way of the Charging Bull” and “Let’s Face it Pal, You Haven’t Lived Afro Pop”. Both tracks are textbook examples of what Math Rock sounds like. Every song here is a highlight quite honestly, but I find that since this is an instrumental album, that the pieces, while distinctly individual, also have a way of meshing together to take me on one continuous 42 minute thrill ride. Gang Banged With a Headache, and Live is a very intense, brutal, and enjoyable record. It’s also a historic artifact, documenting one night in the life of one of the pioneering rock acts of the 90s, and serves as a fine introduction to the band.

Key Tracks: “Let’s Face It Pal, You Haven’t Lived Afro Pop”, “Don Caballaro 3”, “Fire Back About Your New Baby’s Sex”

Artists With Similar Fire: Battles / Polvo / Slint

Don Caballaro Website
Don Caballaro Facebook
Joyful Noise Recordings

-Reviewed by Kevin Poindexter

Kevin Poindexter
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