San Gabriel trio Bastidas! are driven by the rhythm and the groove, albeit one that is informed by the eccentricities of post-punk. The five songs that comprise their latest EP Time Portal are carried with primal imperfection, creating this symbiotic mesh of pungent noise that welds into a beautifully chaotic whole. Much like their Chino neighbords Abe Vigoda, they embrace kinetic energy with a playfulness that invites the body to surrender. But their new material doesn’t settle on tangled propulsion – the sputtering guitars and whippy bass throbs of opener Pocket Jesus makes for what sounds like a long lost demo from an eighties band from the Athens post-punk scene that never got its proper due. And In the Now is complexly fleshed-out, brandishing an onslaught of spook-laden reverb over latin percussive elements. It careens in random directions, but all these different permutations are still highlighted with a sense of mad menace that’s undeniably theirs. Bastidas! have been around for over five years supporting like-minded acts such as No Age and Health, and it’s about time they start getting some national attention as well.
