Boris – Attention Please [GATEFOLD] – New LP

Boris have never been one for hedged bets or bridled ambitions. Boris' methodical quest to build a legacy of expansive, new heavy music, where no form is too sacred to break, no idea too mainstream to incorporate. If that's their plan, it's largely worked.

Accordingly, there are few release-day gestures more rock star than issuing two albums at the same time, as Boris will do with the electropop-and-shoegaze departure Attention Please and the requisite metal grab bag Heavy Rocks. They mostly serve as reminders of how remarkable and inventive Boris have been and often threaten to be.  Heavy Rocks does the things you expect a Boris album to do. Attention Please at least offers something fresh for Boris. For the first time in the band's long run, Wata takes lead vocal. Her consistent presence offers an atmosphere of patience, plus a cohesiveness that Boris have long since foregone. Sure, she leads the band through several different looks, from the tense, pretty opening title track to the dance-metal anthem "Party Boy". During "See You Next Week", she drifts like a ghost between a world of broken drum machines and guitars meant more for texture than melody. There's a ruminative instrumental for acoustic guitar, and "Spoon", a blustery tumble that-- Wata's willowy vocals aside-- favorably suggests the sound of 1990s American modern rock radio. What's best, the trio doesn't give up on its heavy metal experience; though this album suggests a stylistic mix of new wave and Mazzy Star, Boris play with the rumble and roar of a loud rock band. The bass line during the chiming "Tokyo Wonder Land" is a menacing throb, the guitar solo an acid-damaged roar. "Les Paul Custom '86" emerges as a dance number through sheets of noise, anchored by a riff that would have fit Earth in 1993. Those tell-all touches and Wata's command suggest that this is the better, if unforeseen, avenue for Boris' future. 

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