It comes as no surprise to find out that, when you visit their website or myspace page, their registered domain is BigBigBusiness. There may only be two of them, but they don’t half make a racket. They make more noise than bands with three times the band members, crafting monstrous rock music with riffs the size of glaciers which create a fractured and angular landscape, one with epic peaks and deep dark canyons.

These guys first came to my attention at the ATP Festival last year where they blew my honking hangover into next week. They created a huge wall of sound, like Lightning Bolt but with a more firm footing in actual songs whilst their lyrics dealt with the more painful aspects of life. Here Come The Waterworks builds on their previous work, they sound a lot more focused, the production is a touch more sleek too, the guitar and drums (for that’s basically all that’s involved) are crisp and clear. The drum intro to Another Fourth of July… Ruined batters its way into your head, the faint howl of guitar feedback grows and grows into some deep and dark Sabbath-esque riff which dominates the song. The opening track, Just As The Day Was Dawning, sets the tone for the entire album. It rips, roars and tears it’s way through your speakers (beware headphone users!), the riffs are just so enormous that they dominate the entire record, the drums crash and clatter in a way the sounds impossible. Most of the songs are short bursts of angry energy, but the record ends with two epics. The nine minute I’ll Give You Something To Cry About and the seven minute Another Beautiful Day In The Pacific Northwest. The former shows that they can craft something more than just an aural assault, it wheels around, the guitars more guarded and slower, the drums build up a sinister atmosphere before the song descends into a whirlwind of feedback which builds into the final track. This is certainly something very different for the Big Business boys, more akin to Queens of the Stone Age, there’s a slow building clatter of feedback infused guitars with a hint of either processed guitars or keyboards. It’s actually more reminiscent of post-rock with the music generating images of faraway landscapes. If this is a hint of a things to come, their next album will certainly be something to look forward to.

There’s hints of plenty of classic rock acts hidden away in the mix including Sabbath, Iron Maiden and AC/DC. But the true joy here is that they’ve managed to spin something original out of this mix, the last track especially hinting at talents that could well be developed in their next album. They’re proving that they can’t just do loud and mad, that they can craft and write something really quite special. Bring on Big Business.

Links:
Big Business [official site] [myspace]