i promised post-hardcore last week, so here’s post-hardcore! this is also my first post about a non-english-speaking band, and my first one about a japanese band, so that’s a kind of accomplishment!
boris is a band whose range of genres is nearly as expansive as the amount of bands the velvet underground has influenced. for example, what’s considered to be their magnum opus, boris at last – feedbacker, is lengthy post-rock and drone, while their 2005 album, pink, fits well into hard rock, stoner metal, and post-hardcore. “Pink” is the title track, and an absolute head-banger. as someone who had a huge phase with queens of the stone age, it’s quite nostalgic.
wata’s soloing goes absolutely crazy in the song: noisy, intense, and dominant, with a punk-like rhythm to it as well. it compliments the frantic, loud drumming. takeshi’s vocals don’t try to keep up with the velocity of the instrumentation, but they’re like a slow, defiant march along with his relentless rhythm guitar.
going on a slight tangent here, the japanese lyrics for this song were very difficult to find. i put them into google translate, and they seem to be about separation and the anxiety surrounding it (“理由すり合せられずに悩んでいる”, roughly translating to “i’m struggling because we couldn’t align our reasons”). which is interestingly introspective. give it a listen if you haven’t already!
