Boris: Asia

BORIS: ASIA (2015)

1) Terracotta Warrior; 2) Ant Hill; 3) Talkative Lord Vs. Silence Master.

And here comes the third and, fortunately, last installment of the trilogy, of which the less said, the better, so here is a quick runthrough. ʽTerracotta Warriorʼ is a twenty-minute long noise ho­mage to the deeply buried unknown soldier of China's first emperor, beginning in the form of the whistling wind in the deep underground chamber and gradually layering feedback that probably represents the modern day excavators trying to get through. ʽAnt Hillʼ is ten minutes of crackling electronic pulse (how may times have we heard that already?), an allegory for the ant hill which is itself an allegory for the endless run of silly humans around their daily tasks. ʽTalkative Lord Vs. Silence Masterʼ is ten more minutes of feedback crackle, radio static-style.

That's all, folks. No, really. I am packing my bags now and embarking on the quest to find seven people who actually «enjoy» and «get» this album. Together, we will find a way to break the laws of gravity and quantum mechanics and advance humanity to the... next state of advancement, whatever that is. Watch out for the latest news from The Boris Samurai — until then, thumbs down, but I promise you, once we finally rule the world, that is bound to change.

Boris: Warpath

BORIS: WARPATH (2015)

1) Midgard Schlange; 2) Dreamy Eyed Panjandrum; 3) Behind The Owl; 4) Voo-Vah.

ʽMidgard Schlangeʼ: 11 minutes that probably depict the daily activities of Jörmungandr, the World Serpent. Since the Twilight of the Gods has not yet arrived, these activities seem limited to breathing, snoring, and farting, all of which are depicted in a bravely monotonous form by Boris who are well-known for their stern realism in portraying the daily activities of supernatural be­ings. If you do not lose your patience midway through, there's actually a semi-cool crescendo of electronic noises that begins around the sixth minute — hey, you could imagine yourself crawling deeper and deeper into the primordial cave as you trail the serpent's length. I hate to say it, but it is far from the worst spooky, tension-building track they've ever produced.

ʽDreamy Eyed Panjandrumʼ: I do admit, freely and of my own will, that I had no idea of what the word "panjandrum" meant prior to hearing this track. Now that I do know, I seriously doubt that anybody in Boris knows, either, because this track is eight minutes of evenly annoying static against which somebody is playing some antiquated version of Arkanoid. That ain't my idea of a panjandrum, and that ain't my idea of spending quality time, either. Awful, not to mention mea­ningless, unless one likes handing out meanings as if they were snot balls.

ʽBehind The Owlʼ: What owl? What is behind the owl? Why can't I hear anything? Is it some sort of racist (actually, ornithist) hint at the alleged deafness of owls? Well, we might as well turn the volume all the way up, and guess what... more static and wind in the wires. «Psychedelic» does not even begin to describe this. Oh well, I'll just pretend that these were nine minutes of silence, so they were just covering Cage or something. Move on.

ʽVoo-Vahʼ: Who knows, maybe this is the first thing that Jörmungandr says when he wakes up and decides it's time to trash the world. Problem is, before he begins, he has to thrash his tail fifty times and give twenty deep yawns. That takes him ten and a half minutes, and by the time he's ready to really kick ass... hey, the record's over. Too bad, I was just getting in the mood.

I have no idea why they are doing this. It's not even like they were behaving like little children, discovering the joys of the studio for the first time in their life — there's nothing here that has not been done earlier, by themselves or by millions of other artists. The first track at least shows some signs of work — the other three might just as well have been recorded by the instruments without any input on the musicians' part. Yes I know, it's all «limited edition for hardcore fans only», but really, how hard does your core have to be to allow them to dick around with you to such an extreme? And even if they're just dicking around, it's not that original, either: nobody beats Lou Reed at that game. Thumbs down, obviously.

Boris: Urban Dance

BORIS: URBAN DANCE (2015)

1) Un, Deux, Trois; 2) Surrender; 3) Choreographer; 4) Endless; 5) Game Of Death.

On May 2, 2015, a nice spring day on which both Maya Plisetskaya and Ruth Rendell left this pathetic world, Boris released three albums at once — the best thing about which was that neither of the two ladies would have even the slightest possibility of ever being exposed to them during their lifetimes. Chalk up another personal record for Boris, but at this time I do not even have to mention that «the gesture» must have inevitably taken place at the expense of such nice things in life as listenability, originality, and emotional impact. If you have any doubts, let us give a brief run through the tracks on the first one of these, Urban Dance — it won't take long, as there are only five tracks in total.

ʽUn, Deux, Troisʼ is 4:30 minutes of feedback crackle, largely resembling static waves from your car radio, with the volume pushed all the way up for some masochist reason. ʽSurrenderʼ is yet another of this band's failed attempts to make their own post-rock statement — failed, because this time they seem to think that a good way to add impressive dynamics to their atmospheric soundscape is to... incorporate some MORE radio static right in the middle of the track! That's like wow, a symbolic marriage of organised beauty and freaky chaos. ʽChoreographerʼ is 8:45 minutes of... you guessed it, more radio static, except now the bass knob is also turned all the way up and you got some spooky post-Fripp whooshing guitar lines flying in the background from time to time to turn your experience into a truly volcanic one. ʽEndlessʼ only actually goes on for 9:43 minutes, over which it also tries to mesmerize you with several layers of feedback, electro­nic hum, loud percussion, and very deeply buried harmony vocals, but this time it does not even begin to meet the «post-rock challenge» because everything it does, it does during its first se­conds (no attempts at building anything up whatsoever).

Finally, at 11:18, ʽGame Of Deathʼ is not only the longest track on the album, but also the one with the most justified title — it does sound like the soundtrack to some particularly violent, bru­tally industrialized shooter, where you not only have to splatter as many brains of your enemies as possible, but you also have to do it working under extreme sonic conditions: nothing but feed­back, industrial grind, explosions, and machine-gun rattle to lead you to that final 100% kills vic­tory. Remember, though — if you survive this at top volume just once, you render yourself immune against Islamic State torture, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and Justin Bieber ft. Nicki Minaj music videos. Sure beats cold showers anyway.

Summarizing: 1 attempt at an actual music piece (not highly competitive), 1 attempt at an ambi­ent conscience manipulation (does not work on me at all), 3 pieces of crap that might have worked a little better if they were all joined together — in Absolutego fashion — because one huge piece of crap is always more impressive by definition than several small pieces of crap. I mean, what would impress you more — a pile of dinosaur dung or scattered rabbit droppings over a dust road? To me, Absolutego was the musical equivalent of that dinosaur dung. Rabbit drop­pings, though, are a bit of a turndown in comparison, which is why Urban Dance, an album that, unsurprisingly, has nothing whatsoever to do with any sort of urban dancing, gets an assured thumbs down. 

Boris: Noise

BORIS: NOISE (2014)

1) Melody; 2) Vanilla; 3) Ghost Of Romance; 4) Heavy Rain; 5) Taiyo-no Baka; 6) Angel; 7) Quicksilver; 8) Siesta.

Press release information: «Their most all-encompassing effort to date. It is an amplification of Boris’ endless pursuit of musical extremes while moving aggressive, intense rock into new terri­tories. Here, the band masterfully intermingles sludge-rock, blistering crust punk, shimmering shoegaze, epic thunderous doom, psychedelic melodies and just about everything else they’ve ever done. In writing Noise, BORIS was intent upon condensing all that the band had explored over the years, in order to create something more bold, streamlined and powerful. And, upon completion, the band considers Noise its most defining effort.»

As you can already tell, the omens are not good. Usually, when a band itself declares that album so-and-so is its «most defining effort», this means a desperate PR effort to predetermine the lis­tener's attitude — surely, if the band members themselves say so, it must be right. Fortunately, I only discovered the press release after subjecting myself to several listens, throughout which I only found the record boring; had I known about these superlatives early on, I might have thought of it as hideous. To state that Noise is «moving aggressive, intense rock into new territories» makes even less sense than stating that America was discovered by Bob Dylan in his 115th dream. This is standard late-period Boris — the band that has long since moved away from its semi-ori­ginal sound and is now largely making its living with a synthesis of metal, shoegaze, noise, and ambient psychedelia, nothing whatsoever about which could be considered a «new direction». On the contrary, if anything, Boris are getting more and more «retro» with each new outing.

And this outing, unfortunately, is far from their best one: I have not been able to discern even one interesting track anywhere on here. As usual, there are good guitar tones, plenty of energy, and, indeed, quite a bit of stylistic variety, but nothing is done here that could even vaguely pique my interest. Take ʽQuicksilverʼ, for instance, the first track off the album to be freely streamed: seven minutes of «speedcore» whose only value is... speed. Awful singing, dull riffage, flashy soulless soloing — this music is not evil, or scary, or angry, it is just... speedy. Or ʽHeavy Rainʼ, sung much better by Wata, but utilizing such predictable «doom-laden» chords that not even the extra heaviness can save the song from... okay, I'm repeating myself.

This is really unbearable because I'd actually like to like this — they are obviously trying to be artsy and accessible at the same time, but this post-rock vibe is just killing them: the 18-minute ʽAngelʼ is such a blatant (and incompetent) rip-off of some Godspeed You! Black Emperor epic that it makes me want to scream out loud — for Amaterasu's sake, guys, you've been going at this for almost twenty years now, how come with each new album you are becoming less and less original? You had that thing about feedback which was more or less your own schtick — now you have completely abandoned it to focus on these third-rate imitations?

Everything here is just one large exercise in soulless, hookless mannerism, so it's pretty sad news (but predictable perhaps) that they would consider this their «defining effort». Naturally, you do not have to take my word for it, but please do not listen to this album without being able to place it in its proper context — you owe that much to people like GY!BE, or My Bloody Valentine, or even Radiohead (did I mention the heavy debt that ʽGhost Of Romanceʼ owes to OK Computer?) who actually defined how «artsy» music would sound in the modern age before Boris came along and decided, for some reason, that they could do just as well, and that they could be justified in not writing good melodies as long as they could combine all this into one melting pot, where you mix pickles with apple jam and goat cheese with dark chocolate. And don't even trust the album title — because this album is not Noise. It's just Nonsense, and the rating is a certified thumbs down.

Boris: Präparat

BORIS: PRÄPARAT (2013)

1) December; 2) Elegy; 3) Evil Stack 3; 4) Monologue; 5) Method Of Error; 6) Bataille Sucre; 7) Perforated Line; 8) Castle In The Air; 9) Mirano; 10) Canvas; 11) Maeve.

I do not know why Boris decided to give this album a German title, considering that it was only released on vinyl in Japan. Maybe they wanted to raise their fellow countrymen's awareness of the peculiarities of German orthography — a rather superfluous task, given how most Japanese were already fans of Motörhead (oh well, at least Präparat is actually a real German word, un­like most of the orthographic perversities of the metal bands). Maybe it was a hidden tribute to their country's allies in World War II, and we should actually sue the band for hitherto undisclo­sed Nazi sympathies. But most likely, it was simply one more typically Boris act, completely devoid of any meaning other than a random blast of wind could blow into it.

A brief runthrough. ʽDecemberʼ is a quiet, barely noticeable «post-rock» instrumental, supposed­ly mood-setting, but it's hard to hear anything in the first place. ʽElegyʼ is like a bad And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Boris noise track, plenty of feedback, mad drumming, and hushed psychedelic vocals that never take any distinctive shape. ʽEvil Stack 3ʼ is one minute of feedback from Jimi Boris, overdubbed with aeroplane noises or something. ʽMonologueʼ (which is any­thing but, featuring quite a bit of polyphony) is Godspeed You! Black Boris rolling out a slow, steady crescendo that ultimately fails because the dominant theme contains no interesting musi­cal ideas. ʽMethod Of Errorʼ is Boris Vai and it is actually cool for the first fifteen seconds — they did not invent that particular metallic tone, but they know how to use it to swallow you whole. Problem is, they swallow you for seven minutes, and always in the same way.

Side two opens with ʽBataille Sucreʼ, Boris Sabbath finally pummelling out a monster metal riff that I cannot «visualise» — it does not display a whole lot of invention, though I guess the whole thing is not half bad as far as second-hand art-metal goes, and is probably the best of this entire lot. ʽPerforated Lineʼ is forty seconds of My Bloody Boris churning out melodic noise rock that appears out of nowhere and goes to about the same place. ʽCastle In The Airʼ is two and a half minutes of Badly Drawn Boris playing a distorted waltz on pump organs, digitalizing it, cor­rupting the sound track with a virus and symbolically infecting your mind as well. ʽMiranoʼ is five minutes of Radioboris where Takeshi is trying to convey the sadness, misery, and ennui of the world with an OK Computer-style delivery, and I honestly do not recommend exposing yourself to this. ʽCanvasʼ is five minutes of Lou Boris paying tribute to Metal Machine Music — certainly not for the first time. And finally, ʽMaeveʼ ends the album on a brief Kraftboris note, with electronic pulses, wind blasts, and an overall feeling that maybe these guys would like to advance the coming of the final doom in some way, but fortunately they just don't know how.

In other words, we're back to thumbs down territory here: even if the album is pretty diverse, most of this diversity once again downplays Boris' greatest strength (noise control) and yet still tries to be in the «artsy» / «experimental» ballpark rather than continue their semi-successful toyings with «accessible» pop and hard rock structures that made the 2011 albums tolerable. Mostly just bland, derivative, boring, and useless — «unlistenable» only when Takeshi begins to sing like Thom Yorke, but at this point, I'd rather expose myself to «unlistenable» Boris than boring Boris, because at least nasty failures give you something to talk about.

Boris: Attention Please

BORIS: ATTENTION PLEASE (2011)

1) Attention Please; 2) Hope; 3) Party Boy; 4) See You Next Week; 5) Tokyo Wonder Land; 6) You; 7) Aileron; 8) Les Paul Custom '86; 9) Spoon; 10) Hand In Hand.

The point of this third album released in the same year (in fact, on the same day as Heavy Rocks) sort of escapes me. New Album was their attempt to prove themselves in the J-pop sphere, and Heavy Rocks was a reminder that production is only skin deep, and the substantial difference between J-pop and heavy metal may be much less than one thinks. In comparison, Attention Please is more scattered and less explicit — although I guess that, with a little effort, it could be categorized as their «shoegaze album», or, at least, their «dark, moody, brooding art-pop album». It is much less heavy than Heavy Rocks, much less nipponistically irritating than New Album, but, on the whole, less striking than either of those two.

Like Rocks, this one also shares several (three) remixed songs with New Album, but this time, the differences are mainly cosmetic — ʽHopeʼ, ʽParty Boyʼ, and ʽSpoonʼ are all stripped of some of their electronic layers and receive additional noisy guitar overdubs, bringing them closer to «shoegaze» territory, but not necessarily making them any better. Amusingly, the new fuzzy bass­line that they gave ʽParty Boyʼ has made the song rhythmically similar to Arcade Fire's ʽRe­bellion (Lies)ʼ; however, it still largely feels like a deconstructed version of the original, only open to true appreciation if you are already a fan of its ancestral technostate. The new versions of ʽHopeʼ and ʽSpoonʼ are even less different.

There are some decent new experiences here, though, if you are still interested. The title track is an imaginative piece of «psycho-disco», if you can get past the heavy Japanese accent on the mystically, but clumsily, chanted "attention puh-rease" — the sprinkly electronics and the slow fireplace crackle of «woman tone-guitar» in the background create some suspense, and could even be called «haunting» if you let yourself get carried away. ʽTokyo Wonder Landʼ (as if we didn't know already) has some cool industrial-propulsive percussion and a nicely thought out «chimes / funky guitar» combination running in the background for most of its time. And ʽAileronʼ, sharing its title, but not its instrumentation or mood with the huge post-rock epic from the last record, is actually a pretty, if not outstanding, acoustic folk instrumental.

However, one other area where Boris probably have nothing to pick up is «dream-pop»: tracks like ʽYouʼ and ʽHand In Handʼ show that Wata is getting more and more self-confidence as a singer, but I am not sure if this is deserved — she is not a strong singer technically, her voice is not high enough to work proper «dream magic», and the very fact that she is singing in the beau­ti­ful Japanese language is hardly sufficient these days to make anybody melt in overexcitement. As a result, both these tracks also produce the impression of «failed imitations», and a failure to imitate always comes across as much more embarrassing than a failure to innovate.

Summing up... well, three albums per year is a little too much, especially when coming from a former noise-band who could easily fill up fifty albums of noise per year if it wanted to, but for some reason decided to prove itself in a wide variety of genres all at once. What they should pro­bably have done instead would be one, and no more than one, regular heavy metal album with touches of psychedelia — a Heavy Rocks purged of its «post-rock ambitions». As it is, this filler is in some ways instructive (in the «don't do that, kids» manner) and sometimes amusing for one listen, but I honestly hope not a lot of people will want to mistake it for «art».

Boris: Heavy Rocks

BORIS: HEAVY ROCKS (2011)

1) Riot Sugar; 2) Leak (Truth, yesnoyesnoyes); 3) GALAXIANS; 4) Jackson Head; 5) Missing Pieces; 6) Key; 7) Windows Shopping; 8) Tu, La La; 9) Aileron; 10) Czechoslovakia.

How many bands do you know that have released two different albums with exactly the same title, and that title was not the band's name? I honestly cannot think of a single one at present, though I am almost sure that it's just my mind playing a trick on me or something. But if not, then Boris have this dubious honor of revolutionizing the musical world yet another time — and giving their already brain-ravaged fans an even harder time. Even the album covers, by the way, are com­plete­ly the same, except for the color: the first one was orange and this one is purple. Then again, Boris are well known for often releasing the exact same record with different sleeve colors, so essentially they're just trying to fuck us up here. Completely.

The largest irony of all, though, is that this new Heavy Rocks is... pretty dang good! In fact, it is really the closest thing to a «good» non-noise Boris album since... uh... scrolling... scrolling... scrolling... oh wait, we are already in the Boo Radleys... back... back... okay, never mind. This is a pretty dang good Boris album, period.

So, apparently, at the same time that they were working on their ridiculous «J-Pop» homage, they were also producing a much more hard rock/metal-oriented album, with shades of punk, indus­trial, and psychedelia, that ended up sounding more fun, more aggressive, more catchy, and ma­king much better use of the band's biggest strength (guitar tones). It is still not possible to say if they are being serious, ironic, or clueless, but at least they are definitely being less irritating, and at no times does this record begin to seem openly «stupid», which was my largest beef with New Album and its pervy vibes.

ʽRiot Sugarʼ opens the record with a bona fide Metallica riff, immediately followed by the shrill, multi-tracked, echoey wail of the lead guitar that is more reminiscent of old-school psychedelics, and then followed by vocals that do not openly suck — maybe because they are also echo-laden and multi-tracked, or maybe because they actually belong to Ian Astbury of The Cult, guest star­ring on this particular track. There are quite a few other guest vocalists on the album, by the way, including Aaron Turner of Isis and some Japanese people I am not familiar with, and this in itself is a good sign, perhaps indicative of the band actually willing to go out on a limb and produce something good in all respects... for a change.

The album is refreshingly diverse, too. ʽLeakʼ combines psychedelic falsetto choruses with dis­sonant lead guitar parts that remind you of the old Frisco scene, although the main body of the song is more reminiscent of some early New Wave act like Television. ʽGALAXIANSʼ gallops ahead with the speed and energy of a professional hardcore act, but the guitar tones and accom­panying «revving-up» electronic noises give it more of an industrial feel. The alternate version of ʽJackson Headʼ, with guitar instead of electronica, is a great reminder to me why I so much prefer guitar-based rock to electronica when we are talking energetic/aggressive music — Wata's chop­py guitar chords, backed with Atsuo's kick-heavy percussion, give the song a sharp edge that it sorely lacked in its techno mix. The difference between the two versions of ʽTu, La Laʼ is not as easily noticeable, but I also prefer this more guitar-oriented rendition to the synthesized strings of New Album, which made it kinda corny.

The feelings get more mixed when we get around to the two extended, atmospheric «post-rock» workouts. ʽMissing Piecesʼ seems like an attempt to outdo Godspeed You! Black Emperor, gra­dually building up from a mere trickle into an ocean of sound, with legions of trilling guitars and torrents of feedback eventually bursting through the dam; ʽAileronʼ sounds like some wailing sinner, calling to you out of the depths of hell while Wata's fried power chords and high-pitched guitar howls imitate underground volcanic activity. But both tracks go on for much too long and must have taken the band much less time to prepare than a typical GY!BE mini-symphony — as I already said, in «expanded» mode Boris have to be minimalist Nazis: anything more than «pure» feedback blasts and you begin to sense some deficiencies in their music-making.

Still, whether by accident or not, on the whole these «purple» Heavy Rocks nail it just right. There is no deep meaning to this album, no special social value or sharp emotional resonance — but whenever possible, it kicks ass, and it manages to do so without sounding too ridiculous, too overstated, or too overtly «shocking». I am genuinely surprised at how decent this one turned out: easily deserving of a thumbs up and recommendable to the community at large without any spe­cial reservations.

Boris: New Album

BORIS: NEW ALBUM (2011)

1) Flare; 2) Hope; 3) Party Boy; 4) Black Original; 5) Pardon; 6) Spoon; 7) Jackson Head; 8) Dark Guitar; 9) Tu, La La; 10) Looprider.

A band like Boris is not programmed to sell out, but it is programmed to shock, and what could be more shocking than selling out? There's a paradox for you. For almost three years, the former­ly prolific band kept quiet in the shadows, then blasted back into existence with a vengeance — three records in a row — and the first one of those was... a J-Pop album.

Okay, so it's a Boris-style J-Pop album, which means that it will be noisier and heavier than the average product on the market. But all the ingredients are there — energetic dance rhythms, elec­tronic robot loops, simplistic and repetitive earworm-type chord sequences, and over-excited, over-exuberant vocals, including, for the first time ever (or, at least, for the first time in such prominent lead quality), Wata herself providing the lead on several songs. Yes they can. In fact, they prove they can even come up with a few nagging vocal hooks, though, as in all such cases, the emotional meaning of these hooks is so dubious that eventually you begin to suspect that their only grappling power comes from being repeated so many times.

Seeing as how I already hate J-pop and K-pop with a vengeance (it's a long story on which we shall dwell in more detail somewhere else some day), and how my tolerance level for Boris is already quite low, the first reaction to New Album on my part was abysmal — a band with a very specific, very limited sort of talent intentionally going in the direction of utmost dreck? It's, like, drilling your thumbs down all the way into the floor or something. Later on, it dawned on me that the album may, and probably should, be taken as a cute musical joke — that the very idea of an underground psychodrone band switching to a near-degenerate style cannot be anything but a diligent exercise in post-modern synthesis. That made things easier, but still, there's only so much distance one can cover with sardonic «joining of the unjoinable» without annoying the crap out of the listener. At least, the listener who has not yet become an adept of the Temple of Kawaii.

Speaking of earworms, ʽParty Boyʼ, pre-released before the album, most definitely has a catchy techno chorus; shows that Wata has a nice, soft singing voice; and has a very interesting and totally unpredictable instrumental break, where, all of a sudden, they decide to play a slightly dis­sonant piano melody, clashing against the chugging beat. Alas, this is insufficient for me to be able to call it a «good song» — any good song has to have some sense of purpose, and ʽParty Boyʼ just baffles me. Other than being danceable, is it a love song? Is it a parody? Is it a psyche­delic experience? Is it sad? Is it joyful? Is it sarcastic? Is it earthly? Otherworldly? The lyrics, referring to «strobe lights», «mysterious nights», and «riding on the stardust», seem to suggest a club atmosphere that is metamorphing into some transcendental experience, but the melody and arrangement are way too sparse and formulaic to truly blow you away — after all, Boris are not known for being experienced masters of electronic arrangements.

The «darker» tunes here, like ʽBlack Originalʼ, work better, with cold, distorted electronic vocals that mesh aggressively with guitar and keyboard overdubs in what sounds like an endless sea of police sirens and warning signs. But they are relatively few. More often, we get odd tributes to old school synth-pop (ʽJackson Headʼ), straightahead fast pop (ʽFlareʼ) or dream-pop (ʽHopeʼ) songs, and something that probably owes its existence to classic shoegaze (ʽSpoonʼ), only sped up to a tempo that no legitimate shoegazer would probably endorse. All of them feel decidedly secondary, unsure of themselves, unclear as to their purpose, too dance-oriented to feel magical, yet too self-consciously artsy to pass for pure dance fodder. And even despite the relative loveli­ness of Wata's tone, the other singer is still crappy, and Wata herself conveys no sense of depth beyond the glam-artificial tenderness.

Finding myself completely disinterested in coming up with things to say about these songs, I'll just say that it is probably sort of a «fun» page in Boris history, and it will certainly leave the ave­rage Boris fan thinking about a thing or two — yet I will still take regular straight-faced techno, shoe­gaze, or electro-pop over this incoherent mess, and I have a hard time realizing why somebody with a good knowledge of these genres would want to give New Album more than one passing listen with a smirk on his face. Or perhaps this is simply a case of me being completely out of touch with modern übercoolness.

Boris: Smile

BORIS: SMILE (2008)

1) Messeeji; 2) Buzz-In; 3) Hanate!; 4) Hana, Taiyou, Ame; 5) Tonari-no Sataan; 6) Kare Hateta Saki; 7) Kimi-wa Kasa-o Sashiteita; 8) Untitled.

As usual, there are about a million different versions of this album — Japanese, American, Euro­pean, CD versions, vinyl versions, orange vinyl versions, yellow vinyl versions, limited edition gift-packed 8-track polka-dot versions with sugar on top, in short, just about anything possible to emphasize the creative freedom, psychedelic spirit, and unique individuality of the music and the artistic process behind it. As far as I understand, the American editions, distributed by the Southern Lord label, are significantly different in terms of tracks, running lengths, and mixes from the Japanese Diwphalanx editions. But guess what? I'm wasting enough time already on one version (Diwphalanx); I have no desire whatsoever to learn whether the Southern Lord version improves on it in any way, or, at least, I have a certain premonition that is much stronger than any such desire.

This is where Boris kinda sorta «go pop», in that they use drum machines, samples, and, most importantly, sing on every track — and while Wata's guitars are still very much recognizable, the focus is never so much on noise and drone as it is on melody, or, at least, painful attempts to create something by way of melody. The band members themselves called it their «sell-out al­bum» and went on to tell everybody how it is supposed to be taken ironically, because, well, if you name one of your tracks ʽMy Neighbor Satanʼ and everybody starts thinking of it seriously, you might get in some trouble, at least once you set foot outside Japan, where cajoling around with demons is not looked upon with as much prejudice as in Christian territories.

Unfortunately, the «irony» is largely confined to the lyrics, which are in Japanese, and are largely devoted to in-jokes, such as describing the contents of an old live concert video by the Melvins (ʽBuzz-Inʼ). Outside of any specific context, Smile just sounds like an odd mix of styles (electro-pop, hardcore punk, industrial metal, atmospheric post-rock), all of which, in one way or other, had already been tasted by Boris before, and now they are back with this strange attempt to put it all together and make something comprehensive, cohesive, and ambitious.

The result is a meandering, directionless, and utterly useless mess that fails this particular re­viewer's «bullshit test» on just about any count imaginable. The only track that makes any sense is ʽMessageʼ (ʽStatementʼ) that opens the album — its combination of a «huge typewriter»-type drum machine, a scary bassline, and ʽSympathy For The Devilʼ-style falsetto ooh-oohs sets up a tense anticipation for Wata's shrieking wah-wah leads, and even though the track is still spoiled with bad singing, it takes up seven genuinely nightmarish minutes and it could point the way to something even more nightmarish, but...

...this is where the mess starts for real. ʽBuzz-Inʼ is two and a half minutes of boring metalcore. ʽHanate!ʼ is four minutes of ear-destructive industrial metal, followed by one minute of boring acoustic psycho-folk. ʽFlower, Sun, Rainʼ is a «beautiful» ballad that seems to be an attempt to write something in the old San Francisco vein, with phased acoustic power chords and Big Brother & The Holding Company-style passionately ugly feedback solos — all of it sounding like some particularly stupid pastiche. ʽMy Neighbor Satanʼ tries to cross Sigur Rós vocals with noise and psychedelic rock, but the singer sounds like an American Idol loser and the music sounds like all the individual instrument parts were randomly pulled out from a samples library and super­imposed over each other without any plan whatsoever. And then, as the tracks get longer and longer (culminating in the 20-minute untitled finale), the «post-rock adoration syndrome» gets wilder and wilder as they relocate from Japan to Iceland — only to find out that a tourist is still a tourist, and that Takeshi's chances at becoming Jónsi are slim at best.

Most importantly, it just seems to me much of the time that these guys have totally no idea of what it is that they do, what it is that they want, and what it is that they can. Quite possibly, that is the idea: get in the spirit (at least, formally) of styles and artists they like, and then just get carried away by the moment. But liking industrial music, or ambient-style post-rock, or hardcore punk, is not quite the same as understanding it, so that you can then add something of your own to it, and these guys, so it seems, understand nothing. This is not the way it's all supposed to be sung, or be played, or be combined together — it's like taking a coherent book and rearranging all the words so they no longer form grammatically correct, or at least stylistically engaging sentences. Be it in­tended as serious or ironic, an album like Smile ultimately has no meaning, and trying to «relate» to it is like trying to adapt to a useless genetic mutation. Thumbs down, of course.

Boris: Vein

BORIS: VEIN (2006)

1) Untitled (part 1); 2) Untitled (part 2).

Noise.

More noise.

A Russian quote from Stalker.

Even more noise.

Drums and noise.

Sixty-three minutes.

Sucks.

Thumbs down.

Blessed silence.

Boris: The Thing Which Solomon Overlooked 3

BORIS: THE THING WHICH SOLOMON OVERLOOKED 3 (2006)

1) Leviathan; 2) Dimly Tale; 3) No Ones Grieve Part 1; 4) Sola Stone.

Uh.. okay. Once again, I am probably not qualified to discuss this because I listened to it in MP3 format when you're totally supposed to consume it on vinyl. Moreover, if you think you're getting away easily by consuming it on orange vinyl, having laid your hands on one of the exclusive 700 label-dis­tributed copies, think again — there is also an exclusive exclusive light blue vinyl pres­sing, of which there were only 300 copies and they were distributed by the band themselves while on tour. And maybe there's a lock of Wata's hair included in that one exclusively exclusive exclu­sive copy that is currently owned by the luckiest Boris fan in the world, but don't spread the word around too much or you'll stir up the bounty hunters.

Naturally, the included «music» is Satan's shite incarnate (or, rather, «immerdate», to be on the safe side of the linguistic business), but did I even need to tell you that? This is, after all, the third installation of stuff that Solomon overlooked, and this time the list of said stuff includes: (a) 17 minutes of bubbly lo-fi guitar/electronic ambience with an eventual droning crescendo that still sounds unbearably lazy (ʽLeviathanʼ); (b) two and a half minutes of surprisingly clean, but not very informa­tive bass feedback (ʽDimly Taleʼ); (c) seven minutes of very dirty, almost grimy feed­back (ʽNo Ones Grieve Part 1ʼ — of course, ʽPart 2ʼ was on the previous album, because since when were numbers meant to mean exactly what some stupid Indian jerks assigned to them thousands of years ago?); (d) thirteen minutes of equally dirty feedback, but this time overwhel­med by almost as many minutes of mad drumming (ʽSola Stoneʼ) — if this was actually a live jam, poor Atsuo probably had to collapse at the end (and no, I am not going to express any empathy here, even though I had to collapse as well).

Anyway, this is all such an apparent toss-off that I am not even going to compare it to Bardo Pond this time — this stuff suffers even in comparison to Boris themselves. ʽLeviathanʼ and ʽSola Stoneʼ probably have some potential, but the dynamics are so trivial that I'm guessing they pro­bably just concocted them on the spot, when in reality this kind of music requires very careful and meticulous planning (think post-Barrett, pre-Dark Side Pink Floyd, for instance). But yeah, by all means, feel free to join the exciting hunt for blue vinyl — if this is Wata's way of telling you that this is art, what choice remains to us other than kowtow and acknowledge? It's not as if my thumbs down is going to get Japan thrown out of the League of Nations again, anyway.

Boris: The Thing Which Solomon Overlooked 2

BORIS: THE THING WHICH SOLOMON OVERLOOKED 2 (2006)

1) No Ones Grieve Part 2; 2) Dual Effusion; 3) Merciless; 4) An Another After Image.

The title of this and the next album should be enough to warn you that this is another experi... no, actually, let us not abuse the term, because this particular kind of art has long since ceased to be any more «experimental» than your average teen pop album. Rather, this is a warning that this is another collection of harsh, monotonous, repetitive, and not particularly ambitious noise tracks that should really be experienced under their proper Japanese titles, because the English transla­tions probably come from Wata herself (who is a notoriously bad English speaker).

That said, there may be something to like about ʽNo Ones Grieve Part 2ʼ: unlike everything else here, it's got some dynamics — after a ninety second pure feedback intro, the drums kick in and the music becomes a fast, wild, rip-it-to-shreds blast of psycho-metal-punk, like the Stooges' ʽL.A. Droneʼ, sped up and integrated with a weeping minor key folk guitar part on top. As hard as it is to endure the thing for six minutes, there is at least something here worth enduring. You could even visualize this as the equivalent of a funeral ritual by an alien civilization, as friends and relatives of the deceased roll around on the ground in hyperbolic despair, tearing their hair out, ripping their clothes, and howling in artificially induced anguish. Kinda cool.

ʽDual Effusionʼ and ʽMercilessʼ, unfortunately, are not cool — the former is a rather unima­ginative (for 2006) space drone that does nothing that has not already been done by the likes of classic Hawkwind, and ʽMercilessʼ is like ʽNo Ones Grievesʼ stripped to its feedback core, with­out the cool-sounding rock/folk guitar overdubs and the maniacal drumming, and, of course, it has to be the longest track here. Fourteen minutes of crunch for those who love nibbling the charcoal-burned tips off their French fries because if it ain't really cancerogenic, it ain't worth it. Anyone for fourteen more minutes of crispy, crunchy feedback? Help yourself, and you get a bonus reward — three minutes of lightly humming guitar ambience to patch up your ears with ʽAn Another After Imageʼ. One thing you can't say about these guys is that they're cruel to their listeners — on the contrary, they are always willing to offer you some silence as an antidote. Let's face it, they could have their CDs manufactured so that they get forever stuck in your player on tracks like ʽMercilessʼ — once you've popped it in, you might just as well start looking for another piece of hardware. This is the Land of the Rising Sun, goddammit, you gotta be ready for everything. But they're not really merciless, they just pretend to be. They're really more concerned about cleaning the mess up after Solomon. Unfortunately, they don't do a very good job here, so another thumbs down.

Boris: Pink

BORIS: PINK (2005)

1) Ketsubetsu; 2) Pink; 3) Sukuriin-no Onna; 4) Betsu-ni Nan Demo Nai; 5) Burakku Auto; 6) Electric; 7) Nise Bureddo; 8) Nurui Honoo; 9) Roku-o Mitsu; 10) My Machine; 11) Ore-o Sute-ta Tokoro.

Let us list all the references to other artists that veteran reviewer Thom Jurek has made in his review of Pink, Boris' first venture into the «accessible» territory of post-rock composition: Ride, My Bloody Valentine, Isis, Sigur Rós, Nadja, Jesu, Mono (we go to Japan now), Guitar Wolf, Iggy Pop (we go back into the past now), MC5, Sunn O)))) (okay, back to the present), and Acid Mothers Temple. That's 12. Okay, now the Pitchfork review by Brandon Stosuy, who do we have here? Sigur Rós, Isis, Jesu, Melvins, Motörhead, Olivia Tremor Control, Unwound, Drive Like Jehu... oh no, that's just 8, not counting additional historical references.

The question is, now that Boris have moved into this «normal» territory, cutting tracks that be­gin to re­semble «songs» every once in a while, are they still Boris, or are they merely a potpourri of all these influences, contemporary and archaic alike? Do they have an agenda, or are they just selling out? Unfortunately, as much as I would like to like Pink, if only for the usual awesome­ness of Wata's guitar tones, not even repeated listens can convince me that the record ever once rises above the level of kitsch. If this is ironic music, it is too boring to sink in deep. If it is dead serious music, it is just plain awful.

There's always that third possibility, of course — that this is simply fun music. Starting with the title track, it is music that bluntly invites you to headbang, and at least on one occasion it even invites you to dance (ʽElectricʼ, though, as if acknowledging the embarrassing nature of the pro­position, the track clocks in at a measly 1:45). Sludgy guitar tones, punkish tempos, screamed vocals — song after song is a mosher's paradise. Then they slow down and become your usual Black Sabbath... oh wait, I am falling into the namedropping trap myself.

Well then, here be the problems. First, there are more vocals here than ever before. They all seem to be delivered by Takeshi, and frankly, he is awful. His constant screeching sounds neither angry nor crazy — it is just irritating, like the nagging of a loudmouthed peddler on the street corner or something. (Actually, I believe that drummer Atsuo also has sing... er, vocalizing duties, and carries them out with approximately the same effect). Had all these songs been joined into a single track with all the vocals wiped off for good, that would have been a big plus.

Second, the introduction of short compositions does not mean the introduction of good riffs. Well, not entirely true. The machine-gun riff of ʽPinkʼ (belonging in what I call the ʽBreadfanʼ category for lack of a better term) is sort of mildly interesting. When you combine Wata's tone with speedy finger-flashing playing the results are fun, it would be useful to deny something as obvious. But apart from that, 99% of the riffs still sound as if they have an efficient software piece that de­constructs old Sabbath riffs and puts them back together, with predictably worse results because the software has no idea of the kind of chord sequences that really gets your goat. I mean, listen to ʽElectricʼ — it's like a cross between ʽSupernautʼ and ʽN.I.B.ʼ and... something else. Esnes on sekam ti tub looc sdnuos ti. If you know what I mean.

Supposedly the most important compositions on the album are the two longest numbers — ʽKetsubetsuʼ, a «regal» drone piece that really does conjure all these references in Jurek's review (yes, even Sigur Rós, with its choral harmonies and ringing rainbow-y guitar dubs over all the noise), and the closing ten-minute gallop piece which I would probably mistake for a lost And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead composition if not for the annoying Japanese vocals. On second thought, though, I probably wouldn't, because those guys would have chickened out when it came to basing a ten-minute track on exactly two musical ideas. In any case, both tracks are deadly dull — unfortunately, I cannot share the enthusiasm, so common among reviewers, over the mad fury of the opening minutes of ʽOre-o Sute...ʼ because it is hard for me to endorse something just because it is mad and furious. If it went on for sixty minutes, that would at least be an artistic statement. Since it only goes on for ten (I think there's also an extended version that throws on eight more minutes of feedback), it's just a bore.

On the whole, a drastic thumbs down and a radical disagreement here with tons of glowing reviews on RYM and other sites that often extol this as Boris' finest hour — much of which pro­bably has to do with the fact that it was the band's first widely distributed US album. In this humble reviewer's opinion, Pink simply shows that Boris are spiritually incapable of producing genuine «rock»-type material. One of the few dissonant reviews on RYM put it short and sweet: «Stick to drone guys». Couldn't agree more.

Boris: Soundtrack From Film Mabuta-no Ura

BORIS: SOUNDTRACK FROM FILM MABUTA-NO URA (2005)

1) Theme; 2) The Middle Of The Stairs; 3) A Bao A Qu; 4) The Slow Ripple Of A Puddle; 5) Your Name; 6) White Warmth; 7) Melting Guitar; 8) Yesterday Morning; 9) Amber Bazaar; 10) Smoke Sequence; 11) Space Behind Me, Part 2; 12) The Picture Of The Wind; 13) It Touches.

«Imaginary film», the title should read, because no film with the title of Mabuta-no Ura («Under the Eyelids») actually exists — Boris simply stated that they imagined this film in their minds, and then wrote the soundtrack to their imagination. Now — if that ain't art, then what is? How much more artistic, spiritual, transcendental does one get than writing music to accompany visuals that appear under your eyelids, triggered by the mystical force of imagination?

But there's some bad news, too. As awesome as the mystical force of imagination really is, the sobering reality is that most of the time, the force makes you imagine all sorts of random crap (I bet you can agree with me on that one). Consequently, once you try writing music to imagined random crap, you are quite likely to end up consciously writing crappy music to accompany the subconscious results of your imagination. And since Boris have no songwriting talents whatso­ever (there, I've said it), and their main appeal lies in their «tones» and «minimalistic attitude», it is only logical that the final result is an absolutely pointless bore.

«At least the tracks are short this time», you could say, and you'd be wrong, because with long tracks, the band at least has a point — debatable, but a point nonetheless. These short bits, though, are simply meaningless. With ʽThemeʼ, you think you could possibly expect a «theme», but what you really get is a two-minute long droning alarm call in a tunnel, or so it seems. Impressionistic? Symbolic? Psychedelic? Whatever. ʽThe Middle Of The Stairsʼ follows it up with two minutes of slow acoustic/electric strumming where we are probably supposed to luxuriate in the combining humming overtones of the two instruments — hey, if you thought you knew how to appreciate the guitar sound before hearing Boris, hear Boris and think again.

Following up on that, the soundtrack gets more and more diverse, but that is exactly the most ter­rifying thing about that: no matter what they do, it all sounds derivative, meaningless, and dull. ʽThe Slow Ripple Of A Puddleʼ — yes, about as exciting to listen to as the slow ripple of a puddle, and I cannot even defend it on the grounds of «minimalist philosophy», because the little guitar loop that they use here has no deep emotional power of its own to warrant becoming the focus of the track. ʽYour Nameʼ features the band playing a rudimentary hard blues tune: three and a half minutes of what sounds like a 12-year old Neil Young practicing his first scales. ʽMel­ting Guitarʼ — okay, with a title like that you'd expect a massive sludge metal eruption or some­thing, instead, it is simply a little more meandering free-form droning, sort of like what you get in the mid-section of King Crimson's ʽMoonchildʼ, only much more aimless.

Anyway, to cut a long unnecessary story mercifully short, the only track here that merits the slightest consideration is ʽIt Touchesʼ. Closing out the album, it runs longer than the rest and has a rather cool, even hypnotic, bass/drums groove, against which all of Wata's little guitar tricks may be perceived as colorful flourishes rather than just pointless doodling. Nothing particularly great, that is, but pretty much a musical masterpiece compared to all the other small bits. Then again, the best solution is to cut the bullshit and simply ignore the album altogether. Total thumbs down — I'm so desperate, I'd rather even have me some John Frusciante than this.

Boris: Dronevil

BORIS: DRONEVIL (2005)

1) Giddiness Throne; 2) Interference Demon; 3) Evil Wave Form; 4) The Evil One Which Sobs.

Okay, so apparently this is one of those fairly rare Zaireeka-type albums where you are supposed to plop in two CDs at a time and listen to them interfere. Sounds logical, since the first one is all «drone» and the second one is all «evil», er, «sludge», really. ʽGiddiness Throneʼ constructs a background that sounds like twenty minutes of deep cavernous echo; ʽInterference Demonʼ gives you twenty minutes of what sounds like an annoying siren hacked at mid-point and stuck in a single, barely changing tone; ʽEvil Wave Formʼ offers some dynamics in totally familiar shape, with Wata's usual monster guitar tones interrupted for a few minutes with calm, echoey ambience; and ʽThe Evil One Which Sobsʼ is sixteen more minutes of the same.

I have to confess that I have not tried juxtaposing the two, and am therefore not qualified to make opinions about the resulting sound. I freely admit that it would not have been difficult, even on a computer — just stash two media players on top of each other — but something inside me just told me no. In the back of my mind, I can see where the combination of the deep rumble of ʽGid­diness Throneʼ and the gigantic metal waves of ʽEvil Wave Formʼ would certainly make far more sense than listening to them separately, but I have no desire to waste my time on that.

Allegedly, as claimed by some adepts of this album, quite a bit of work did go into the synchro­nizing of the tracks, so that the «lows» and the «highs» of individual tracks correlate with each other, but you will just have to check it for yourself — a lot of one's opinions on Boris actually depends on one's preconceptions of Boris. I am afraid, though, that since ʽEvil Wave Formʼ does nothing for me on its own, it will probably not do much more when nutritioned further by the «deep», but simplistic texture of the «drone-ambient» track. It's all just a lot of boring sludgy bullshit, and clearly, the «success» of Dronevil depends on nothing but the gimmick. Give it a chance if you want, spare me the trouble — if I am really in the mood for modern day doom metal (which is rare), I'll go get me some Agalloch instead.

Boris: The Thing Which Solomon Overlooked

BORIS: THE THING WHICH SOLOMON OVERLOOKED (2004)

1) Scene 2; 2) A Bao A Qu; 3) The Dead Angle Which It Continues Showing.

I guess I have to give props to these guys for releasing their most unlistenable records as «limited editions» — this one originally came out as 500 copies of colored vinyl, and probably cost a fortune, so that 500 lucky souls could reach their own personal Nirvana by subjecting themselves to forty minutes of jarring feedback, and everybody else could just happily ignore this artistic statement, left behind in a state of immature unworthiness. Unfortunately, the digital era came along pretty soon and messed up all the clever configuration.

Not being aware of the exact circumstances surrounding the title of the album, I, like everybody else, assume that «Solomon» here refers to King Shlomo (970-931 B.C.), known mostly for his wisdom and his large number of wives and concubines, and that, consequently, the title prompts us to give a thought as to what exactly was that one thing, that one tiny little thing that the King managed to overlook in his only slightly less than infinite, God-given wisdom. More than enough reason here, I guess, to force yourself to sit patiently through the entire forty minutes of the re­cord — I mean, who knows, maybe the answer is waiting right there in the end, and once it's all over, just think about it, you might actually be wiser than Solomon himself. Who wouldn't wil­fully give up a pair of ears to gain access to a secret that may have been unknown to the wisest man on Earth?..

Too bad I have to spoil this for you, but then, every once in a while this blog finds itself obliged to go out on a salvation mission. The title is just one big hoax — there is really nothing but a huge, endless sea of feedback here. The first and last track merely feed you crude, primal sludge, a ten-minute cauldron for starters and a twenty-minute barrel for the main course. Faint hints of a droning melody can still excuse ʽScene 2ʼ, but ʽThe Dead Angleʼ is probably the most extreme thing these guys came out with so far, beating out Absolutego and everything else — basically just one bass note that takes its time to burn up and fizzle out, only to be replaced by the same thing again, and again, and again.

In this context, ʽA Bao A Quʼ (named after one of J. L. Borges' pseudo-mythical creatures) separates the two sludge monsters like a symphonic phoenix — at least there's some development here, as the track moves from high-pitched guitar whine to hellishly overloud, overdriven howls and roars. Even so, the title is pitifully wasted this time around (fortunately, it would be reused later on for something much more distinctly musical).

In short, this one is «not for everybody», and by «everybody» I mean «everybody who is already a Boris admirer». It does get me to wonder, though — what if Boris did not have access to tech­nology, or even electricity, and still wanted to make this kind of «music»? What would they have done? Rubbed on a double bass with a live crocodile? Raped a tiger with a loosely tuned cello? Set the entire town on fire and walked around playing on a deliberately unstrung guitar? Actually, each of these ideas, now that I think of it, seems more exciting and innovative than what we have just heard here, and I hate being cruel to animals. Thumbs down, unless you're a big fan of limited editions on colored vinyl — they can be so cool to show off to friends, just do not forget that you won't have that many friends if you ever decide to play this for them.

Boris: Boris At Last: Feedbacker

BORIS: BORIS AT LAST: FEEDBACKER (2003)

1) Feedbacker I; 2) Feedbacker II; 3) Feedbacker III; 4) Feedbacker IV; 5) Feedbacker V.

I do not understand what «at last» is supposed to mean here. «At last» an album truly worthy of Boris? «At last» an album on which Boris have properly mastered the art of feedback? «At last» an album with Wata on the front sleeve? And, for that matter, what is the symbolic meaning of the «pool of blood» in which she is reclining? Getting you to confess that yes indeed, one does occasionally get the urge to shoot the guitarist through the head in the middle of a Boris album, but if she already did that herself, so much for the better?..

Anyway, this is actually Boris' third continuous «suite», and their second one where the body is split in several parts, corresponding to feed-phonic «movements» that illustrate several different stages of... uh, feedback. Or something. Actually, not all of Feedbacker consists exclusively of feedback — there's some «feedfront», too, particularly in the second part which is almost melodic by Boris standards, and in the fifth part, which is basically just a brief reprise of the second. Oh, and in the third part, much of which sounds like an outtake from Heavy Rocks. But do not expect any of these parts to be a celebration of traditional harmonic values: whatever happens, Boris stick to their well-oiled guns, or they wouldn't be able to release two or three albums per year.

Anyway, Part I is really all feedback, wave upon wave of it, stylistically reminiscent of what Neil Young did on Dead Man — get the blast going, then step back and experience it seeping away from your body like a tidal wave while waiting in apprehension for the next one. Cool tone, but I always felt Neil's feedback solos had more thought behind them than this «ooh, I so love what I can do with electricity» schtick. Besides, if you asked me how this one is different from anything on Absolutego or Amplifier Worship... hmm...

Part II is probably the main reason this album exists — it is a slow «ambient blues», gradually strolling through your living room for about eight minutes, after which a massive wah-wah solo takes over and the composition reaches a «drony climax». Aside from the solo, any melodic con­tent here is purely minimalistic, and the tempo eventually gets very irritating when combined with the minimalism of the melody. Clearly, if there is a heart in this LP, it is somewhere in the middle of this 15-minute brew, but on the whole I'd say that somebody like Bardo Pond are much more impressive with this kind of heavy moody melancholia. Perhaps somebody would like to argue that Wata's gauze-like «countermelodies», little droplets of electric guitar finely sprinkled over the repetitive rhythm chords, express impressionistic beauty like a modern day Debussy or some­thing, but I don't feel much subtlety in these droplets. Besides, the album is called Feedbacker, so there is no sense pretending that anything here that doesn't have anything to do with feedback will be the album's main achievement, really.

So we're not really after the heart, we're after the brawn, and most of the brawn can be found in Parts I and IV — IV being the most abrasive and vomit-inducing part of the experience, with the listener tied up to a malfunctioning electric chair for about ten minutes. If you feel like you haven't lived without being tied up to a malfunctioning electric chair for about ten minutes, then Boris At Last: Feedbacker will correct that omission for you. If you feel like you could pass, Feedbacker is probably not the best starting place to get into Boris. Unless you're seriously into guro and just want to scoop this up for the album cover.

Boris: Akuma-no Uta

BORIS: AKUMA-NO UTA (2003)

1) Introduction; 2) Ibitsu; 3) Furi; 4) Naki Kyoku; 5) Ano Onna-no Onryu; 6) Akuma-no Uta.

So, may you ask, what may be the hidden meaning behind making the album's front sleeve into a transparent imitation of Nick Drake's Bryter Layter, with Takeshi and his double-neck replacing Nick and his acoustic? My guess is that not only is there no hidden meaning, but there is simply no meaning, period. They just liked the cover, and wanted to have one just like it. Alternately, you might think that the symbolism of the action is precisely in the fact that it is hard to think of two more dissimilar albums, in just about everything, than Nick Drake's Bryter Layter and Boris' Akuma-no Uta. So you have the full spectrum of possibilities where you have one at the utmost left end of the axis and the other at the utmost right, and they come around full circle and one opposite becomes the other in a symbolic visual merger...

...nah, they probably just loved the shoes. (Although I wouldn't be surprised if somewhere deep in this mess they actually hid some brief musical quotation from Nick's textbook, transposed to sludgy electric guitar — you never can tell with these whackos). Also, for that matter the original album cover was different: white surface with a minimalistically sketched silly four-legged bug in the top right angle. Not that any of this matters in the least, but such is the price of weirdness: make yourself too weird and your listeners will never really know what does matter and what absolutely does not.

Anyway, finally arriving at the music, the two obvious — in my understanding — virtues of the album is that it is short, and that it has a good balance of slowness and speed. Conspiring against them are the two equally obvious shortcomings: the album does not reveal any progression over Heavy Rocks, and the album's melodies are on the expected usual level of boredom. Once again, other than Wata's bonecrushing guitar tones, almost everything sounds like a hastily produced amalgamation of elements from Sabbath, Rush, and, this time around, perhaps also Can — the longest track on the record, ʽNaki Kyokuʼ, in certain parts sounds heavily influenced by the clas­sic jam style of Can (which, after all, is only natural if one remembers the Japanese origins of Can's most classic vocalist). It is not so much the vocals, though, on that track that sound uncan­nily-Cannily, but rather the drums — Atsuo's complex, steady, unflinchingly executed drum pattern is eerily reminiscent of Jaki Liebezeit. Not that it helps all that much.

The title track, which closes the album, is probably supposed to represent the climax of its Omi­nous Evilishness — it ain't called The Demon's Song for nothing, right? (Amusingly, the word Akuma ʽevil demonʼ, when re-transcribed to its modern day Chinese equivalent, will be latinized as Emo — not that I have any idea why I mentioned that). But in reality, it is simply four minutes of sludge taken at two different tempos. For the first two minutes, you tread through the sludge, cursing everything in your path, and then for the next two minutes the sludge treads over you, so that you never get the idea to badmouth sludge again. This particular demon is sure a messy, dirty, drippy one, but not in the least scary — more like a local trickster, perfectly content to merely fling its own faeces at you from behind a tree.

Uh... what else to say? No idea, really. Last time I checked Pitchforkmedia to get an alternate informed opinion on the album, all I got was «charging, smoke-filled, and raw» (you betcha), «fuzzy riffs and heavy rhythms» (you don't say!), «deployed in long, shivering drones or fiery, chugging blasts» (too true, too true, except that I wouldn't describe any of these drones as «shi­vering» — how can something so thick and so deep be «shivering»?). Aye, this is Boris, all right, but is this specifically Akuma-no Uta? These descriptions are applicable to the vast majority of this band's output. This album's specificity seems to be stored largely in its front sleeve. At best, ʽNaki Kyokuʼ, with its soft, arpeggiated (but rather typically doom-metal) intro and Can-style beats, might have half a face of its own. At worst, all is forgiven if you are a major fan of the Boris crunch — then you'll be only too happy to swallow whatever it is they have just crunched for your enjoyment.