New Album

Japanese musicians are born to surprise

Should you take it for granted that Asia is a delicate and obscure matter, Japan must seem to you the best illustration. The country’s art will not ever allow us, those who live far from there, get to the core. We are only capable of touching it and, if lucky enough, tasting a tiny bite. And, of course, we are destined to be surprised or, if we have had too much, experience a shock afterwards. Cultural shock. Aggressive propaganda of Japanese music, launched recently, has brought us an opportunity to get to know a lot of interesting and original performers. They are peculiar mostly because they seem to be playing the same stuff, but in a different, their own kind of way. The Tokyo trio Boris display this phenomenon particularly fully. The ensemble has been referred to a dozen genres now, but they keep surprising. It feels sometimes that the same cause of their activity is to challenge the global music community. We are accustomed to their manner of neglecting rules and patterns as they offer most unexpected style combinations, but their release of three albums within just one 2011 year was a most unpredictable move. Besides, as if trying to tease the public even more, the Tokyo outfit named one of these works New Album. However kidding or even humiliating it could be, the record itself, indeed, is worth your attention.

One step towards pop format

New Album might be easier to swallow for those who are not well or not at all familiar with Boris catalogue. Often titled stoner rockers, the Japanese musicians have actually stepped aside from it and look to offer something really different. Skeptics and Boris haters will not go far into terminology and simply call the whole process an act of market-oriented tactics or, plainly speaking, selling off. In fact, the psychedelic aura that reigned on the band’s previous CDs, is still present here, but rather as a shy guest whom they were obliged to invite. Instead, we get more of purely Japanese music. The vocals are processed into what seems a anime character voice, and the songs let out sweet, sometimes even too sweet, tunes. The last integral component is spacious beats, drums and whatever else that forms rhythm section. Alas, it is not so easy to specify because the musicians works hard to cover every instrument with a thick film of electronic-cosmic-chaotic sounding. Party Boy, one of the record’s first tracks, offers the whole mixture in its perfect balance. We have simultaneously a funny and melodious tune with a true rock vibe. And you can be sure you get a lot like that on New Album.

The most original record in Boris catalogue

Drive, power, basses and dance pulsating are what create the skeleton for the New Album set. What grows on this skeleton may vary throughout the record, but the impact remains equally strong. Impressive are Tu, La La with prominently heavy guitars and the following Looprider, a very mild track. The key is the elaborated rhythm section. The album also alternates tempo regularly. Hope, and Flare sound nice thank to high speeds and rich and thick sound. Their stylistic opponent, Pardon?, on the contrary, proposes a thinner and slower stuff, which, in the meantime, helps build a feeling of longing and anxiety. You can not just forget another song, the one that stands right in the centre of the set. Spoon is really the central episode of New Album. It is a unique synthesis of stylistic borrowings, including influences of psychedelic rockers and dance electronic wizards. The sensation of unreal is made deeper through the female singing soaring high above the music. So we can draw two main conclusions here. First, New Album is a breath-taking record that will come to you as a great revelation. Secondly, this release in no way can be a starting point for those who make first steps towards Boris because it presents a material that has too little in common with what the band used to do before.