I found out just before I closed shop last night that Boris was playing a quasi-surprise show in New York, sponsored by VICE, at The Annex on Orchard Street. With my ears barely recovered from the night before, I decided that I needed to go back for seconds. I picked up Ilya in Jersey City at about 10:30 and we were parked on Ludlow (cringe) ten minutes later. Walked around the block and down Orchard to the bar, which has a non-descript, brick facade. We went inside and the place was just starting to fill up a little. There was a steady trickle of hipster dufuses walking in and out. Ilya saw some kid he knew from BU and chatted him up for a while. They were giving away some sort of weird energy drink + alcohol concoction. It tasted like bad carbonated iced-tea with an unnatural aftertaste. I had a pint of Paulaner.
The first band that went on was a metal band from Brooklyn that was mostly instrumental based, but the last few songs included that really guttural screaming like you’d find on an Isis album. I don’t know what to call that style vocal delivery, but Ilya kept referencing the episode of Home Movies where they make a PSA about how kids shouldn’t stick marbles in their noses.
We approached the stage after that band finished. Thankfully I brought along earplugs this time, to save my babies (that’s what I call my ears when no one’s around). We stood about five rows back from the left side of the tiny stage. Takeshi (double-neck, skinny-as-a-rail bass&guitar player) only brought one of his Sunn extension cabs and the Ampeg 8×10 tonight. Wata (guitar/echo girl) had her full Orange stack. Atsuo had his full drum kit and the gong. Tonight they only had microphones (that I could see) on the kick and the rack tom. They played an identical setlist to last night, and I thought it absolutely amazing how many people couldn’t take the volume and simply left. It was really cramped during “Blackout” and “Ibitsu.” A mosh pit broke out in the middle of the floor, but it only lasted about thirty-seconds before security intervened.
The vocals sounded much better last night than the night before. When Takeshi switched from bass to guitar, I tried to alert Ilya that “this is where it gets even louder,” by using the international sign for “LOUD,” which is making a fist and then releasing, kind of like squeezing a stress ball or something. He looked at me oddly, and then when they broke out into “Just Abandoned My-Self” he shook his head “no” and moved to the back of the room. I stuck around a while longer before joining him. He wanted to leave, I wanted to hear “Farewell,” which was the last song. Outside the club, he asked about the sheer volume, “Why, why would anyone willingly put themselves through that?” I thought it was awesome.
As we walked out, there were two cop cars positioned outside The Annex. I saw someone–probably the club owner–talking to one officer, saying, “Yeah, we’re in the process of soundproofing still.” Must have been a noise complaint–and for good reason. Boris is the sound of a sonic boom. Either that, or an army of really loud robots.
