I reckon I saw more live music during 2012 than ever before, apart from the summers when I went to a music festival (I have tentative plans to attend FujiRock 2014…). Rounding off the year, just as the last of my disposable income disappeared in the run-up to Christmas, I was fortunate enough to see two of the most startling – and loud – Japanese rock bands during their respective UK tours. Lucky me indeed.
This was the fourth time I’ve seen the instrumental outfit MONO live, being as they are a band who tour extensively worldwide year after year. I’ve not had the pleasure of seeing Boris in a live setting before last weekend, although I knew them by reputation. If you don’t pay attention to anything that follows, remember this: both of these bands are a real treat. Go see ‘em if they’re playing near you.
This isn’t MONO’s first visit to Manchester’s Sound Control; the house PA is very good for the size of venue though, which lends itself well to MONO’s meticulously layered arrangements and trademark loud-quiet-loud dynamics. Their latest album is even further down the orchestral path than their previous studio efforts, which begged the question: how can they recreate that sound on the road without supporting musicians?
The answer turned out to be “very well indeed.” There seemed to be a few sampled snippets of string sections looped in, but overall the performance relied on the same instruments and equipment that they used on previous tours and recording sessions. It was surprising to hear a set comprised mostly of new songs with a few fan favourites from the previous record, but the emotional impact was no worse for that. On a couple of numbers Tamaki set her bass down to add piano lines or chimes of glockenspiel but it was a pleasant surprise to hear how their simpler setup got so close to the raw power of a full orchestra.
Interestingly, many of the other attendees I spoke to were fairly new to the band and hadn’t seen them live before. The Hymn to the Immortal Wind-era songs got a particularly enthusiastic reaction – especially from Pure As Snow (Trails of the Winter Storm), which was a real highlight – but the general reaction was overwhelmingly positive. I’ve suspected a few of the older fans are less impressed with the band’s recent evolution in sound, but even if that assumption is correct I think they’ve made some new fans as well. It’s impossible to please everyone all of the time of course, but it was great to see that their new songs contained everything of the MONO sound that we know and love.
Around the same time, Boris were on their tour of Europe and stopped by at the Brudenell Social Club in Leeds…coincidentally, the same venue where I saw MONO for the first time a few years back. Again, they’re a band with a relatively small yet loyal following and also make an effort to break away from the familiar formula that usually constrains bands that rely on guitars, bass and drums.
This time I walked in without owning any of their albums and knowing only a few of their songs. With earplugs in (a measure that is pretty much essential if you want to stand anywhere near the stage without suffering hearing damage when these guys are playing) it soon became clear that they’re a very self-assured and competent group of professionals whose chaotic façade conceals admirable musicianship.
Beneath the tooth-rattling drums and sludgy walls of fuzz guitar is a band who, contrary to first impressions, have a very firm handle on what they’re doing. Despite being in the usual rock trio format plus a touring guitarist (even if the bass is a bass/guitar double-neck…) cranked up to nosebleed-inducing levels, Boris are very different stylistically from MONO’s cinematic instrumentals; they also bear little resemblance to most other bands either.
The second song of the set, a brooding number called Rainbow that I recognise from the soundtrack to Tetsuya Nakashima’s psychological thriller Confessions, was magical but the set overall challenged the crowd to keep up with a rollercoaster ride between dark stoner rock, energetic punk and experimental wails of distorted feedback…and they performed all of it with effortless aplomb.
One similarity between these two bands is that, although the melodic aspects may occasionally be hidden beneath experimental noise that plays with expectations of what guitar rock can be to our jaded ears, it’s delivered with sincerity by people who have lugged a van-load of gear halfway around the world to play songs to people who may not even speak their language. I don’t know about you, but that’s pretty rock-and-roll to me.
This year marks an interesting time for both bands as far as I can see. MONO have continued their progression from experimental instrumental rock to a more unique niche lying between that and orchestral music that you’d expect to hear on a film soundtrack. Despite this, their live shows are still the loud, intense and mesmerising experience that they have always been.
Boris have, from what I’ve read, also broken out of the Japanese indie scene with an individual guitar-based sound but recently added a more shoegaze-y, pop-orientated aspect that was released at the same time as a record that sounds more like what their existing fans are familiar with. The departure in question is the album Attention Please, a copy of which I picked up after the show last weekend. As different as it is from most of what the live set I heard sounded like, I love it.
So there you have it. If I don’t post any more articles before the end of the year, best wishes to you all and if the world does end in December 2012…my ears at least seem to think the Apocalypse sounds pretty damned good.