Boris – Amplifier Worship (Southern Lord) 2003
Boris are a many headed beast. Are they Doom? Sludge? Post-rock? Metal? Avant Garde? Stoner? The answer predictably is all of the above. I’ve previously posted on the mighty Feedbacker record of a couple of years ago and that record is like a doom version of Post Rock with the odd groove thrown in. Amplifier Worship is a very different beast and reminds me that they did after all name themselves after a song off the Melvin’s awesome Bullhead record. Amplifier Worship is pure sludge metal. It’s like Earth crossed with the Melvins. I’ll be honest I’m pretty partial to a bit of Boris but this is not my favourite thing of their’s that they’ve done. It sometimes feels that it’s all a bit pointless. When a band such as the Melvins define a genre so well it feels like anything else is merely a photostat of the original. If I want to listen to sludge then maybe I’ll just listen to Bullhead or Houdini instead. Boris make much better records than this, especially the sublime Flood and Akuma No Uta. That’s not to say this is not a decent record. There are some moments on Amplifier Worship which work for me on so many levels but I suppose it comes down to which incarnation of Boris works best for you.
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