Hipster metal? Crushing doom? Fiery psych? Ambient claustrophobia? Collector scum heaven? BORIS are all of these and more. The oftentimes augmented (by the likes of MERZBOW, KEIJI HAINO and SUNN O)))) three piece from Japan have been confounding expectations, filling clubs, pounding eardrums and emptying wallets at a dizzying pace, accelerated by the sudden prodding that a timely Pitchfork review of Pink, the relentlessly tenacious team of Southern Lord and Inoxia PR, and the band’s seemingly unending appetite for hitting the road. They once again appeared in Boston, marking the fourth time in little over two years, and the third headlining show in a row in front of a sold-out room at The Middle East. As with the previous shows, this was heavy on the material from whatever most recent record hit the shelves, Smile in this case. A bit less excited about this release, I was on the fence about going until it was confirmed that the masterful MICHIO KURIHARA ( GHOST, STARS, WHITE HEAVEN, DAMON & NAOMI, etc) would be slicing the heads off innocent bystanders with his Gibson SG while WATA set up low and obliterates their legs from the kneecaps down with her black Les Paul. Whereas TAKESHI cuts a striking figure with his long hair often obscuring his face while he sings, and the headstock-less guitar/bass double-necked Steinberger is a unique/familiar calling card, ATSUO is the most animated of the three, all hair and skin and limbs flying around, and is the de facto front person despite his rear stage position.
As such, he gets the proceedings underway by jabbing a drumstick in the air towards the audience, yelling, then turning around to smash the massive gong behind him. He’ll end the show by another pounding of the gong, then a vault over the kit and a lunge into/onto the crowd. In between was most of Smile (in fact, almost in the same order as the US pressing…why the Japanese pressing has a different order and different mixes is something you’ll have to ponder on yr own), with a flailing version of “Pink” sprinkled in for good measure. “Flower Sun Rain” was an odd choice to start with, a dreamy psych-hazed eye drooper, made ‘famous’ by the Japanese group PYG in the ‘70s. They played it on last year’s tour and obviously have a fondness for it, but I’d have opted for the opener of the Japanese Smile, the blistering “Statement,” all surging voltage and over-driven guitar from both Wata and Michio, along with the ‘woo hoo’ vocals in the chorus from Takeshi and a head-mic’d Atsuo. That initial tempo problem was fixed by “BUZZ-IN” (another homage to MELVINS), and the mass of writhing bodies got that much more frenetic when “Pink” was machine-gunned at them, prompting me to gather my gear and flee the front, heading for safety. The staid (overly studied?) rock moves of “Laser Beam” and “Floorshaker” made me think that when Atsuo (aka Analfangsatan) was busy doing the JUDAS PRIEST-laden graphics to last year’s Long Hair and Tights split they did with DOOMRIDERS, he’d done more than was necessary method acting and listened to too much 80s heavy metal parking lot fodder.
Michio Kurihara
All that tiger-striped bandana nonsense was swept away when the band called upon Kurihara to summon the electric banshees he harbors in his expansive kit, and unleashed during the last part of the show; “No One’s Grieve” and “You Put Up An Umbrella” were absolutely massive, the sound of sound folding over and over itself, cascading in a pure liquid wave and crashing out over everything. This is why he’s such a great addition to Boris; they can bring the sturm und drang like a lot of their contemporaries, but the competition falls by the wayside when Kurihara get serious, really serious, about playing guitar, and playing it in such a complementary style to Wata’s. For the final crushing ~20 minutes when they played the untitled closer, it was an epic which hinted at the Roger Dean-esque cover art to Groon, not overly proggy in the way of YES but fully capable of creating several different living and breathing beasts into one terrifying whole. This is the kind of stuff where Boris really push all my right buttons; yeah the pounding rave-ups are fun, but give me stuff like Dronevil or Feedbacker any day of the week.
TORCHE pretty much bored the piss out of me when I saw them two years ago, in the opening slot for MOGWAI. Plenty of energy, but zero in the part where music connects to cortex or aorta. Well, that’s all changed; this band is a million times better. In a move which can only be termed brilliant, they took the stage and launched into an instrumental which was the riff to the BEATLES “She’s So Heavy.” Perfect! I was plumbing the depths of my brain for a while before I put two and two together and it equalled Fab Four. From there it was flat out rocking, the band having a great time while flashing smiles and bobbing heads, the Travis Bean-type metallic guitars (Jonathan’s bass, Juan’s guitar) clanging and burning. For “Meanderthal,” the detuned low E string on both STEVE BROOKS guitar and Jon’s bass were oscillating wildly when struck, a big sine wave amplifying more and more until it’s out of control, like the Tacoma Narrows Bridge disaster. Juan charged the audience at the end, guitar outstretched as a sacrifice to the awaiting clawed hands. Fun stuff.
Jonathan Nuñez
Steve Brooks
as always, more photos of the bands are available at my site
