Four on the Floor

Before they were Melvins, bassist/singer Jared Warren and drummer Coady Willis were Big Business. While Big Business may not provide them with the same paycheck that comes from the last six years of playing with The Melvins, it certainly allows them the platform to showcase their ear-splitting talents. Their latest effort, the four-song EP Quadruple Single, proves that Warren and Willis have the chops to carve out their own name in the sludge-rock mantle.

On Big Business’ previous three albums the duo were testing the waters—mixing in some gothic tones, relying on lengthy instrumental moments to speak for them, trying out different support personnel. With Quadruple Single, it’s clear they’re no longer fucking around. They chose to highlight the band’s strongest instrument: Warren’s vocals, a pitch-perfect mix of Lemmy and Ministry’s Al Jourgensen. Adding 400 Blows’ Scott Martin on guitar and maintaining Toski Kasai (who provided the melodic leads of 2009’s Mind the Drift), Big Business are officially a “power quartet.”

While Quadruple Single is only four songs, it allows Big Business to put their best foot forward and make the audience hungry for more. From the opening drum pounding of “Always Never Know When to Quit” to the cacophony that closes “Guns” (where you have no choice but to concede that, as the lyrics declare, “guns are better than everything else”), it’s impossible not to pay attention. Big Business mean business, and hopefully this chilling teaser of an EP is a taste of what’s to come.