balistica

The Jungle Science e.p. In a gag audio clip on Balistica's debut EP, an interviewer describes these Austinites as "a sonic, punk outfit." Then comes the kicker: "Why did you guys leave the sombreros at home?" One only hopes that was a gag! In any event, the name Balistica says it all – insolent, urgent, snarky as necessary, and urban in an architectural rather than cultural sense. Aching limbs of steel, the hot shudder of concrete, the false sparkle of glass, and every once in a while, the sweet breath from a patch of green all emanate from The Jungle Science's 20-minute run time. "Rag" opens the disc with a deceptively mellow riff that leaps into an industrial grind churning with rock & roll rhythms. The kiss and slap lyrics ("Your adoration sets me free. It's like a razor, it cuts me deep ... you know I want it so") end in a raw punk rant, strangely lightened with a familiar Arab-world vocal riff sailing over it all near the end. The previously mentioned audio clip follows, slipping into the liquid, Dick Dale-like guitar opening of "Hard to Swallow," where relentless punk rhythms tumble with a ripped vocal driven beat. "Racer" is the most popilicious of the disc, amazingly elevating the timeless pop phrase "doot-dooty-doot" to a tolerable level. An insistent brew of punk-driven, moody rock rhythms demanding to be heard finish off the disc. The demand is well worth heeding. Sombreros? Balistica don't need no stinkin' sombreros.
- The Austin Chronicle

Balistica
The Jungle Science EP
Balistica combines modern heavy alternative rock influences with goth, funk, and electronic elements into a pulsating brew of energy. If you're looking for a new band that'll raise your bar a couple knotches, here it is. Good stuff.

Reviewed by Bryan Baker 10/2/2004.
- Gajoob.com

rouching in this tiny tikki hut, cozied up to the very un-cozy Suburban Terror Project, is like realizing you just sat down next to a nest of angry bees… the Africanized type. You are tormented by the power of their frenzied buzz, knowing that they would lay down their lives just to sting you with pain. If you try to leave, they will look up from their busy, busy work, swarm at you and kill you.

STP’s music is not easy to listen to, nor to recall the next morning. It’s hard to describe, so I can’t dismiss it as typical. They’re hysterically thrashy, with that aggressive dissonance that now seems to dominate mainstream hard rock and metal. There isn’t an exact label for their type of sound, but if it’s some sub-category of metal, I’d call it “angry bee sting metal.” Or maybe spazz-core.

Balistica was just as weird, but totally different. Over the course of their ballistic set, this band annoyed me so perpetually that eventually they won me over. The singer was this kiniptic big dude that you hope won’t fall on you. He stomped and thrashed about in front of the stage, too close to the barstools for my comfort. Further racking my nerves, he faced his bandmates rather than the audience – not even watching where he was shifting his hefty butt. My buddy scribbled me a note: “There ain’t enough Ritalin in the world.” As it turned out, he contained himself without inflicting injury or humiliation.

The Vapors on crack! They pounded out a quirky sort of disco death metal, and grew on me until I thought, this band should be playing someplace way bigger with break-dancing and a moonwalk. The guys looked sweet in their matching pentagram shirts and the drummer wearing headphones (so he could hear the rest of the band, they explained). They rolled out with a Romantics cover, “secrets that you keep… when you’re talking in your sleep.” The sulking den of criminals turned into a sing-along, and I realized this band was so gay that they ruled and I have to see them again.- Bek Sabbath - rank and revue

When I first saw Balistica, their music was stuck out to me because there was some sort of uniqueness. This was also the when The Red Eyed Fly decided to be an ass to a band that night. More details in the interview.

Kex: My name is Enrique. I go by Kex. I Play in Balistica, that’s one L. Um…We're four members. Want me to tell you the names of everybody?
KD: Yeah
Kex: Ok well Serge, he plays bass, we started the whole project a while ago. Then we got Morgan on guitar and finally we got Ivan on drums. And we also got our Mixer Roland MC 505 playing all the techno stuff on the background.

KD: So let's start with the obvious, how do you feel about the show tonight?
Kex: The show tonight was cool. I thought tonight we were playing really good. Um so and so happened… I don't know if you heard, but one of the bands that came all the way from Houston was 15 minutes late, and, they weren't allowed to play because of that. So we felt like we needed to stand up, you know, say something about it you know. We thought it was bullshit and we're like, well if they’re not allowed to play then we won’t play (stopped in the middle of the set). I mean nothing against these people (Red Eye Fly) but; definitely as musicians I think we had to stand up, so that's all we did… We actually had prepared a short set list so they could let them play. I feel maybe a little disappointed about making the show even shorter. Because people didn't get to hear all our stuff but at the same time, we felt like “it” needed to be done.
KD: That's understandable. I would of been mad too.

KD: So how would you describe your sound to someone unfamiliar with the music?
Kex: Our sound, well we have a name for our sound. Actually we call it Sonic Punk and we can describe it as The Cars meets Nine Inch Nails meets At the Drive In. We have lots of influences. We grew up in South America; in fact, we’re all actually from different nationalities. So each one grew up listening to different kinds of music. It wasn't just about straight up indie or straight up techno or hip-hop. Instead, we just decided pretty much to mix all those styles and come up with our own genre. We were getting tired of listening to the radio… Like rap, metal, and indie are cool; but, sometimes they lack that passion, and that damn essence that we like. That thing that we just need to do something more energetic and we call it Sonic Punk so that's where it comes from. You just have to hear for yourselves for you to judge it.

KD: So you're not from around here?
Kex: Nah I'm actually from Lima, Peru. Yeah but I've been here for a long time. I still have the accent going on but hey you know it can work both ways so yeah.

KD: How did the name Balistica come about?
Kex: Balistica was coined because I watched too much Miami Vice when I was little kid and in Spanish, Ballistics translates to “Balistica". It’s such a cool sounding word that works out so well. You can go both ways with it, like “I’m going Ballistic-a” I guess.

KD: What song best represents your sound?
Kex: What song best represents our sound? That's a very good question. It's a tricky question too. Especially with our band because we're such a variety of pop and techno and hip hop and rock. I would say "Jungle Science" It's got the elements of alternative. It's got the techno thing going on. It's got the hip hop thing going on. Definitely the Latin thing going on too…Um I'd probably say "Jungle Science". We didn't get to play it tonight but hey I guess we're going to be recording it pretty soon.

KD: What can we expect on the new cd?
Kex: When?
KD: When and what can we expect?
Kex: Ok when. We're expecting it to be out in mid February 2004 and I'm expecting it to be the greatest record ever recorded since the White album by the Beatles. Ah I'm kidding. No, it's definitely experimental and what we want to do is make people dance with different elements of music. Definitely rock, definitely punk, definitely alternative, definitely emo, hip hop-ish you know but making them dance. Making them go “Oh! You know there are far more choices out there”. Definitely. Want to bring a new choice to a new generation of kids too, you know, that are listening to just “punk” right now. So, why not listen to something else, something more dance-ish? Get out and groove. That's what we expect from it.

KD: If you could describe each of your band members in one word, what would you say?
Kex: Whoa ok. I would say for Serge I would say passionate. He's my bass player. For Ivan, I would say focused, really focused. For Morgan, which is our guitar player, uh drunk. I guess alcoholic. Nah, nah I'm just kidding. Um… Fun. Fun. Definitely fun.
KD: For yourself?
Kex: For myself I would say outcast, dork, weirdo definitely.

KD: Any memorable experiences from a show, recording or at a practice?
Kex: Any memorable experiences from recording our stuff? Yeah actually we've been recording our pre-production CD. We're going - so many bands.com