Ball of Wax 39 Songs: Ainara LeGardon – Every Minute

My god, has it really been four years since we last heard from Ainara LeGardon? How the years fly. It was almost exactly that long ago that she released We Once Wished, the blistering LP I wrote a bit about here. I included the title track from that album on Ball of Wax 23; apparently I have thing for title tracks when it comes to Ainara, as “Every Minute” is the song I knew I had to have for Ball of Wax 39 upon hearing her new album Every Minute. The song and album continue her trajectory of fearless, weighty rock, with Ainara wielding her guitar and voice as finely hewn weapons, backed up by the muscular rhythm section of Héctor Bardisa and Rubén Martínez. The tension created in “Every Minute” by the relentless three-against-four rhythm and the elegant bludgeoning delivered by this fearsome threesome is almost too much to bear. I don’t really believe in bucket lists, but I sincerely hope Ainara and her band come to Seattle or I make it to Basque Country to see them before I die.