2023 brings another collaboration from our noisy friends from Japan, Boris, this time with New York industrial metal punks Uniform, perhaps not an obvious meeting of minds but one triggered when they toured together back in 2019.
After Boris invited Uniform to join them on stage for a rendition of “Akuma No Uta”, a certain chemistry emerged that led to ideas for an album collaboration. Following twelve months of preparation, they went into the studio and this is the result, nine tracks of Boris’s trademark proto- and doom metal merged with Uniform’s own brand of aggressive noise.
The album kicks off with first single, the Boris-penned “You Are the Beginning”. A chugging thrashy riff leads into Uniform’s Michael Berdan wailing “I break out in a sweat, it bleeds all over me” and continues from there. Spacey guitar solos weave around the riff before a bridge takes us into more familiar Boris territory, Atsuo’s vocals joining the mix. The tempo is accelerated several times during the song, propelled by the dual drum bombardment from both bands. Aggressive helter-skelter stuff and a pretty impressive opening statement.
Track 3 is “No”, a knowing wink to Boris’ own recent hardcore outing “NO” and things aren’t letting up in terms of speed, intensity or aggression. This is a full-on assault, metal guitars driving along a torrent of industrial noise, those ever-present dual drums providing a d-beat pummelling from the back. Intense stuff. The next track offers a change of pace with “The Look Is A Flame”, another Boris composition. Things slow right down as the track lumbers into being, an oppressive doom-laden monster accompanied by oddly ethereal vocals and anguished wails.
“Angels In The Abyss (Abadon)” is up next, an instrumental, full of static, menace and sparse metallic drumming, like someone tapping out desperate morse code from a place of confinement. Abaddon in Hebrew mythology is the angel of the Abyss, the destroyer and king of an army of locusts, in case you were wondering.The previous two tracks work well as a complimentary pair, slowing things down and increasing the menace while drawing back from the in-your-face aggression of the opening songs. Things take another turn with “Narcotic Shadows”, which starts with some pummelling synth that wouldn’t sound out of place on an ’80s TV soundtrack. In fact, the entire song is a lot more pop than anything else we’ve heard on the album so far. Still time for some wailing guitar and strangled vocals though and a nicely feedback-drenched outro.
The poppy tone continues with “A Man From The Earth”, quite a bright sounding effort replete with ‘woo-hoos’ and even what sounds like bagpipes at one point. Pretty cool whatever. “Endless Death Agony” is next and any idea that things would all be sweetness and light from here on in go straight out the window as the song revs up with the sound of distorted squealing guitars before breaking into angry d-beat driven hardcore once more. “There’s no music left inside for me to keep on dancing” – apparently not, but moshing is still a good option.
Bright New Disease is a great album and well recommended. I do slightly query the inclusion of “Narcotic Shadows” and “A Man From Earth”; they are great songs, but I’m not sure they fit 100% on the album. A minor quibble, nothing more. I’ll also be checking out more of Uniform, who I’ll admit were unknown to me before this.
-Dave Pettit-
