When I was still an active Missoula Rock Individual, there was one particular scene interloper I recall, a younger cat called Ian. I don't know if this guy had hippie parents or what, but for some reason, he was allowed to cavort with us older alcohol abusers until all hours, even though he was all of maybe 14 when I met him. At after-hours parties where there were instruments to be taken up, an ad-hoc "jam" would inevitably ensue, with a rotating cast of wobbly participants purveying awful versions of "Hell's Bells" and what have you. And usually, when you find yourself embroiled in one of these jams, the idea is to get some sort of musical telepathy happening between the players. Some level of communication, however crude, is the crux of any after-hours party jam session (and goddamn it, I hate that word as much as you do, but no suitable replacement has manifested itself to date). And verily, the level of "success" of a jam session, as calculated after the fact, is inevitably a function of the level of telepathy that was perceived to have occurred. When Ian got a little older, say 17 or so, he got up the gumption to get in on these sessions, and he was an incredible drummer in the technical sense. During the warm-up phase of the jam, Ian would deal out really impressive drum "quotes" as I like to call them— little familiar snippets of drumming glory. And onlookers would get stoked because this young cat is on the kit and it looks like it's gonna be a great session because this little kid kicks some serious ass on those tubs, and we all know that a solid drummer can kick such a session up to the next level. But then someone —the bassist, maybe— would deal out an opening riffle, something around which the jamsters might cohesively rally, and Ian would just continue playing drum quotes. Everybody else is finding some common ground, melding their musical minds, and Ian's just going off, completely oblivious to anyone else. It got to where it was a running theme: go to a party, Ian hops on the drums, and pretty soon it sounds like a god dang firing range or something. Anyway, I picked up this Hella record on somewhat of a whim, having read about them somewhere or other. A sticker affixed to the front of the CD shrieked, "THIS ALBUM WILL CHANGE THE WAY YOU LISTEN TO MUSIC!!!!" The band is two dudes, guitarist and drummer, and the drummer reminds me very much of this Ian guy. Total spasmodic flailing. Well, to be fair, there is some palpable evidence of songwriting here, and the drummer is apparently paying attention to what the guitarist is doing. But it becomes clear very quickly that this guy has a very obvious obsession with cramming 128 drum beats into each bar. Just total technique overkill, with very little credible context in which to frame it. The guitar parts are fairly captivating, some sort of high-speed fingerpicking thing with a lot of twiddly things in the higher register, but not in the Yngvie tradition or anything that gay. I don't know... I think these guys are doing something pretty cool, but nothing beyond gimmick status that I could discern. It's definitely worth hearing a few times, especially if you fancy stuff like Ruins or Schlong or even Deerhoof. But they didn't change the way I listen to music.