Boris – Heavy Rocks

May 24, 2011 • Sargent House

After 2008's Smile was such an awesome release, I was pretty excited for three new Boris albums in 2011. This throwback to their identically-named 2002 album was an awesome addition and just what I was hoping for from Boris. Even if they are branching out into pop with the other two albums, this one shows that Boris has still got an edge to them when it comes to straight-up stoner rock and they aren't done yet.

As expected, this album shows a nice mix of songs in the style of 2002's album and their recent poppier stuff (for example, "Leak -Truth,yesnoyesnoyes-", which is decidedly poppy, especially coming after the monster rocker "Riot Sugar"). There is a lot of music in the style of Pink (such as the punky "Galaxians"), which is also nice to heard if you like that album (I do). Like Pink and Heavy Rocks, it's a very fun album when it tries to be, and the mellower long songs are also quite good; "Aileron" especially brings the doom in a really good and satisfying way—a bit reminiscent of Smile's closing track (which is one of my favorites of theirs), making it the standout song on this album.

If I had to pick something to complain about, it would be that 2002's Heavy Rocks, Pink, and Smile are all still better albums, and this album isn't really treading any new ground and as such it does sound a bit tired at times and it just makes me want to listen to their older stuff instead. (It doesn't help that a couple of these tracks can already be found on New Album.) That's not really a problem in and of itself, since I don't want to listen to those albums because this one is bad; rather it's just because it reminds me of them. The songs are still decent; they simply sometimes serve as reminders that Boris has made music like this before, and it's still there to be listened to.

But regardless of the fact Heavy Rocks is, for the most part, nothing new, it's still good. It's still the same old Boris we know and love, full of nice riffs and melodies and textures; even though it may be a bit rehashed it's still a really enjoyable album.

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