ASSOCIATE EDITOR KORY GROW: BORIS AT THE KNITTING FACTORY

I went to see Japanese ambient-sludge-metal-whatever rockers Boris at New York’s Knitting Factory the other night. Eclectic by nature, the band played a steady stream of Sunn0)))-like drone, My Bloody Valentine–inspired shoegaze, and Motörheadbanging garage rock. And given the band’s trajectory from obscure, Wire-approved drone enthusiasts to hipster celebs du jour (thanks to a succession of releases including a collaboration with Michio Kurihara of Japanese avant-garde kling-klangers Ghost), the crowd included button-down-wearing sulkers rubbing shoulders with stinky, greasy Hessians.

The opening act was Brooklyn noise-rhythm duo Growing, but I wasn’t too into their electronics-heavy noise manipulations, so I checked out the merch table instead. (One commenter on Brooklyn Vegan who calls himself “Feedbacker,” which is the name of a Boris album and song, has since proposed the formula that “Boris + Growing = Boring,” but since I skipped half of that equation, maybe I enjoyed myself more.) Perusing the goods on offer, I found a Boris T-shirt sending up the old logo of Von (America’s first black-metal band, IMHO), but they didn’t have my size. I ended up buying the “Statement” 7-inch, the title track of which, I found out today, has a pretty cool video (watch it below).

When Boris took the stage, they flooded the audience with smoke, which was the perfect accompaniment for their dreamlike opening song, “Farewell,” which also opens their 2005 album, Pink. As the smoke cleared, I looked at the three members to find—surprise—there were four members: Ghost’s Kurihara had apparently come along for this tour, as he did on the tour for 2006’s Rainbow, on which he was a guest.

The band went through a set consisting mostly of songs from Pink and their forthcoming Smile. The only misstep in the set was “Floorshaker,” the B-side to the “Statement” 7-inch (the track “Statement” will also appear on Smile), which is essentially a disco song. While I have nothing against disco music in principle—or even against disco music mixing with metal (check out Revolting Cocks’ cover of Rod Stewart’s “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy” if you don’t agree)—Boris doing disco just sounded strained. They closed with Smile’s untitled 15-minute-plus closer, which transitions from beautiful to excruciating to excruciatingly beautiful within minutes, while drummer Atsuo jumped into the audience and crowdsurfed to the back and then to the front.

Many people I know have since said this show was better than when Boris came through with Kurihara the first time around, but I didn’t go to any of those shows, so I can’t vouch for that. I can say, however, that Boris were in top form. They just need to keep disco dead.