Customer Reviews

Amplifier Worship

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This Boris album is a great and lumbering beast. Sneering with rows of teeth, gleaming darkness in its eyes, about to devour the world you once thought was so safe.

It starts with the aptly titled "Huge". this song is nothing but, HUGE. Lacking a traditional song sturcture for the first 7 or 8 minutes, it just repeats a massive crushing riff, doubling over on itself, and just when you think "Hmmmm, a Sunn 0))) rip off" drums come pounding in at a snails pace. The space between the notes is what really grasps you on this tracks as chords ring, distorted and distended for moments on end....This is the genesis of the aformentioned beast. And a great intro to an enormous album. At 9 minutes you are feeling uncomfortable, dont worry, you are getting appropriately prepared for utter devastation.

Ganbou-Ki sets the tunes into action with an incredibly anguished howl and more downtuned lurching guitar and devastating drum and bass pummel before skirting off to the sides of your sanity with a heavy hypnotic bass section. This part of the song, long and unhurried, quiets down the immense pressure put on it, only to add pyschedelic feedback and tribal drumming, and a mounting tension that threatens the quiet security one might find in this piece....Warped guitar soloing enters after a period of almost tranquil and interminable quiet and the bass and drums begin setting the stage for a second pummeling. This track is 15 some-odd minutes long and by now you should understand whether or not you are ready to put up with this kind of self indulgent doom. If not, Bail NOW!. If you do have the patience, please continue for a sonic adventure sure to keep your ears ringing.

Hama picks up where Ganbou-Ki left off, with a little eerie chirp that sounds like crickets before exploding into full on sludge punk that has a very industrial pounding feel. Then, taking a sharp left youre treated to more hypnotic psychedelics and another build which leads back to the beginning of the song, with almost chanted vocals and a great break. 6 minutes for this, the shortest track here.

Kuruimizu begins with another punk workout with some particularly vicious vocal delivery. You must be sweating by now, yes? Lets continue: Sludge punk then becomes the darkest march to the afterworld with martial drumming and a thick lead that dissipates into one thick guitar and some evil whispering. If the first track is to be likened to our beast that we described, then track 2 and 3 are that same beast wreaking doom and destruction on the world it is intent to devour. Then Kuruimizu is the death of that world. The passing of the world into darkness. This darkness comes in the form of a shimmering post rock build that will have the most solid of Godspeed You! Black Emperor fans impressed. A very trippy affair and yet still completely in line with the hell that had been unleashed just 30 minutes before....This extraordinary section almost makes you feel hopeful before leaving you with a flatline feedback drone and the grim realization that this world is now the beast's world and we are naught but a shimmer of the past it once was.

This realization is known as Vomitself, track 5, in which the world is nothingness. A dark hell carved out by the beast, rendering hope and light into dust. Blistering feedback and the most dropped tuning and droning you could imagine this side of the Sunn.

The album as a whole has many analogies that one could make in describing the ebb and flow of emotions here. The sound and progression are top notch quality played by musicians who have a clear idea of what they wish to achieve. The album plays as one long song split into 5 parts that total over an hour of music, so it is truly best to commit yourself to the experience by listening on good headphones or a good stereo and making sure you have the full amount of time needed to absorb this hulking monolith of doom. If you do this, you will surely be taken places, some places maybe you dont want to be taken, but nonetheless a glimpse of a place you wouldnt happen across unless you went looking for it...A darkness, without and within.

If this album pleases you, then I give you this caveat: Boris fans know that Boris is a chameleon of metal, rock, doom, and stoner sludge. Choosing which album to listen to is like picking out what you want to feel. If you want more of the same, then I highly reccomend you seek out their latest "Dronevil - Final" from Inoxia Records, and for a lighter taste, the ambient drone of "Flood". If you want the Boris displayed on their latest and great album "Pink", then you should look to the albums "Heavy Rocks" and "Akuma No Uta"...They have a much more rock an roll feel, ala Sabbath and Motorhead, that is extremely pleasing. But wait! Theres more! They also have a "soundtrack" to a made up film called "Mabuta No Ura" which I would place next to Godspeed You Black Emperor and Mogwai in terms of mood and tone. They also have a few even more avant-garde albums such as their collaborations with Japanese noise specialist Merzbow (Three albums total) and another with Keiji Haino and then theres the first album and an extremely thick slab of hell, "Absolutego"

"Amplifier Worship" satisfies on many levels for its foray into many of the territories that Boris has staked a claim in on their other albums, but if you are looking for a band to keep your interest and you are into a variety of rock and metal styles than Boris is a band that will keep you running to catch up and see what they do next.

This album SHOULD be godlike. In fact it is. However, the pressing on Southern Lord has 2 second gaps between all the songs, and the entire cd is supposed to flow together. Therefore, you get nasty annoying 2 second interuptions that jar you out of the trance into which this is meant to put you. Seek out the import or wait for a 2nd Souther Lord pressing. Pity that once we finally get this at a non-import price it has to be flawed.

If there is such a thing as transcendental metal than this album is its purist form. Assaulting "Melvins-like" guitar riffs give way to almost somber melodies and then return. Introspective and thought-provoking -- it is a gem in any collection.

Buy it!

for the last decade or so music coming out of japan has been increasingly interesting and diverse. from the acid-drenched wailings of the boredoms to legendary noise terrorist merzbow we have come to expect japanese bands breaking through into the western markets to be challenging. and on paper boris are a mouth-watering prospect.

there is no mistaking the fact that boris are, at heart, a drone band. songs last 8-9 minutes often with lengthy interludes of monotonous feedback yet unlike labelmates sunn o))) they introduce elements of stoner and even crusty punk to their low end rumble. its an inspired concept, yet unfortunately boris dont have the song writing skill to pull it off to best effect. in order to use feedback you have to do something interesting with it. sunn o))) bleed frequencies to create thunderous walls of sound and khanate incorporate it into eerie atmospheric, pant-soiling tableaus of sonic evil. boris, however, hold the same note for a very long time which may be all arty but is in fact terribly boring.
thankfully they are not a one trick pony as other elements of their style are commendable. they show a sound grasp of stoner riffing playing in a similar vein to Jerusalem-era sleep and their punked up numbers lurch and grate like discharge on downers.

this is all well and good but, and this is a big but, boris dont seem to know how to structure a song. they have all the right concepts to impress southern lord devotees and should, by all rights, be producing an extremely tasty slice of psychadelic pie. yet it just doesnt fit. blissful drones burst into mammoth riffs without warning and tribal drums appear out of nowhere. these sort of 'turn-on-a-dime' dynamics are exciting in hardcore music but in snail-pace sludge it just sounds awkward.

with a bit more time spent on melding their waywards styles together boris could be something truly spectacular. perhaps a collaboration with drone overlord stephen o'malley or some sonic advice (there are more dials than just reverb!!) from experimentalist aaron turner could see this japanese trio mate their drone tendecies with their zeppelin fetishes successfully. until then, however, boris will continue to be a mediocre band with ideas above their station.

ahhh Boris...how i love thee. your translinear sludgy trippy soundscapes move my guts. you have a nice streamlined approach where things stay clean and very very heavy. yet, when thou art mellow, it besoothes my aching skull. your taste in graphic design is quite respectable (although the u.s. releases have been plagued by horrid art). you define quality music and i shall sing thy praises evermore.
...plus your guitarist is so damn cute.

Mr. MC Hood makes a lot of fine points and is quite right on a lot of them. This album is not perfect, the songs aren't perfect, and there are other suitable directions the production could've taken.

Not perfect but pretty close if you ask me. The band exhibits a rather wide range of styles on this album, discernable ones to my ears include hints of: Grief, Earth, MC5, the Stooges, Venom, Melvins, and some odd ambient yet melodic passages. I would say the band has their own style. They are indeed a drone band as Mr. Hood stated, songs are long and tend to 'drone'(ie: parts are repeated to the point of the listener zoning out). I think it's a great aspect of their music. At first I was a bit put off because to some it could easily be interpreted as boring. After repeated listens it became funny and very obviously done on purpose. When you first hear it happen on a song like Ganbow-Ki, the song moves along at a rockin pace then drops off with the bass and drummer by themselves. As you listen to it, it sounds like they are preparing for a guitar solo, or break, or bridge or something, ANYTHING but it doesn't come the beat just continues. A few things may come to mind: did they mess up and kept it on the final track? Is this some kind of joke where the actual break comes up when you don't suspect it? If the song drones on for any of these reasons I find it funny, but the song keeps going and I soon stop asking questions because I'm zoning out as I listen to it or I forget why I was asking questions in the first place. Much later the music resumes with a new intro and moves in another direction rather different from the way it began. edit: after another listen, this droning aspect isn't as endearing on the track 'Hama' but tolerable.

It's a very pleasant and relaxing style of songwriting where there is really no rush to 'WOW' or amaze the listener, but entertain, occupy, and accompany. It's 'drone music', where you both feel and listen to it not so much to pump your fist and throw cups of beer too. Although their heavy-handed rock n roll segments certainly allow for that kind of behaviour, there's just a bit more to it.

Overall I think this is an incredibly solid album and easily among some of the better records I own of recent times(considering both metal and otherwise). It can be listened to as an album, there are ups and downs and a variety of tones/moods/etc. I add that it wasn't obviously good, I had to listen to this thing quite a few times before I began to click with it and notice the band's subtle nuances.

I would suggest picking it up if you are a fan of heavy music or a fan of rock n roll and don't mind some odd experimentation, keeping in mind the bands I noted in the second paragraph.

Released in 1998, this was the Japanese stoner / doom rock trio's second full-length album. I have to be in the 'right' mood to properly enjoy titles like this. Specially dug the CD's three tracks that average fifteen minutes each - the psychedelic jam work-out "Ganbou-Ki", "Kuruimizu" and the awesome "Vomitself" {features some good bass feedback}. Line-up: Takeshi-bass & vocals, Watu-guitar & ebow and Atsuo-drums & vocals. Should appeal to fans of Wolfmother, Melvins, Sleep, Fu Manchu and Sons Of Otis. A should-have.

Overall, this album is much better than Absolutego was. Huge is probably one of the coolest songs with one of the coolest riffs to ever be and the rest of the album is full of stoner rock grooving. There are even parts in the fourth track that remind me of Sepultura.

Any way, there are alot of quiter parts on this album. Heavy riffing followed by psychedelic noodling, which I like.

I dont know whats with the other reviews, but maybe Southern Lord got their act together. My copy doesnt have the two second gaps they are complaining about.

this reissue not only includes annoying 2 second gaps between songs (that are not on the original), but also the packaging is hideous. the original was so beautiful and elegant and at the same time hilarious, and this one is simply garish and obtrusive.
the music is incredible and essential regardless of the half-assed reissue though. this is truly zen metal and wata is a woefully underappreciated rock guitar god(dess). find the original, and if you can't, settle for this and burn yourself a copy with no gaps and no ugly packaging!

While it is true that the Southern Lord pressing of this album has stupid 2-second gaps in between tracks, I found that if I burned this cd and made a copy of it, I could get rid of the gap, so try that.
Once you get over that... this album is wonderful. It seems to me to be a sort of culmination of many of the past albums of Boris. It is often slow and ponderous, reminiscent of their previous epic Absolutego (one of my favorite songs of all time). But don't expect a second Absolutego... Boris revert to their fast stoner metal days (ie Heavy Rocks) in parts of this album, reminding me of those Boris songs that made me want to put bass strings on a Les Paul and plug it into an Orange amp. Also, on 'Kuruimizu' they go for the sort of long, beautifully melodic guitar noodling that made up most of a previous record called 'Flood' (that one is harder to find). This album is certainly the most varied of Boris's works, and the way the songs flow from one to the other (once i made the copy, anyway) is really quite effective. While there are parts of the album that remind me of previous recordings, and yet the whole thing together makes for something very new.
In conclusion, another mind-boggling record from Wata & crew. not intended for those with short attention spans.

--- a Wata fanboy