Boris

While most might think of Boris as a band of extremes, they are also a band of rather pure and simple work. "Loud" would be one facet of their sound. "Heavy" and "huge" a couple others. "Uncompromising, "unfashionable" and "unrelenting" even more. While they may be very experimental at times, they also limit themselves to a small pallet of sounds, sticking almost entirely to the traditional line up of guitars, drums and vocals.

While they occasionally fall into the stoner-rock sound, they are anything but dull and boring. Droning, yes, but at the same time their music is active and full of a sort of inevitable weight. Their album titles alone are a useful look into their sound: Amplifier Worship, Heavy Rocks, Dronevil, Megatone (with Merzbow!), Sun Baked Snow Cave (again, with Merzbow!), Pink. OK, that last one might be ironic. Anyway, think lots of lumbering guitar riffs, lumbering drums, etc etc.

But it's not all blissed-out guitar drone jams. Very far from it. Over the years their sound has slowly drifted into territory a bit more palatable to the hard rock masses. Their songs are more like songs and less like steaming rivers of slow-moving tar. Their latest album Smile ranges from all-out rockers to downright sentimental tunes. Of course there's also plenty of noise and obliterated instruments, but on the whole it's a solid, thundering, rock and roll album.

Statement


Official Site
MySpace

Members:
Takeshi - Vocals, Bass, Guitars
Wata - Guitars, Vocals
Atsuo Mizuno - Drums

Albums:
Absolutego (1996)
Amplifier Worship (1998)
Flood (2000)
Heavy Rocks (2002)
Akuma no Uta (2003)
Boris at Last: -Feedbacker- (2003)
The Thing Which Solomon Overlooked (2004)
Dronevil (2005)
Soundtrack from Film Mabuta no Ura (2005)
Pink (2005)
The Thing Which Solomon Overlooked 2 (2006)
The Thing Which Solomon Overlooked 3 (2006)
Vein (2006)
Smile (2008)

My Neighbor Satan


Heavy Friends


Pink