Horse Lords have typically honed their complex, polyrhythmic jams on the road, but the Baltimore quartet were confined to their rehearsal space once they were unable to tour in support of 2020's The Common Task. With less pressure to make music that could easily adapt to live performance, they spent more time experimenting and meticulously assembling compositions in the studio. Comradely Objects opens with almost cricket-like synths, then launches into a rhythmic pattern that seems easy enough to follow yet like it would be difficult to plan out and execute perfectly. From there, guitar and saxophone sing in unison, the rhythm launches into double time, everything becomes more repetitive and seems to freeze time, and it then becomes clear that Horse Lords are capable of casting spells with their music. "Mess Mind" confirms that as mesmerizing and technically precise as the band's music is, they still have fun with it. The piece starts out by mixing rave pianos with desert blues guitars, then gradually intensifies the shuffling rhythms while multiplying and scattering the guitar notes. After the kick drum gets noticeably heavier, everything self-destructs in a glitchy blur. "May Brigade" applies Ornette Coleman-style free jazz skronk to a math rock rhythm, but it ends up sounding much more groove-heavy than that implies, at least until its dissonant, atonal ending. "Law of Movement" stretches out for ten minutes, layering droning horns and rotating guitar scratches over a propulsive yet oblong Krautrock-ish rhythm. The last track, "Plain Hunt on Four," is a complex web of notes and beats popping up in sequence at various points on the grid, resembling something that deserves to be synchronized with an elaborate light display. Comradely Objects seems like some of the most complex, demanding music Horse Lords have made, yet, amazingly, it's also their most danceable album. ~ Paul Simpson, Rovi

1		Zero Degree Machine
2		Mess Mend
3		May Brigade
4		Solidarity Avenue
5		Law of Movement
6		Rundling
7		Plain Hunt on Four