Rock Dream (With Merzbow)

iTunes Review

Recorded live at Tokyo’s Earthdom Festival in November 2006, Rock Dream features Boris and noise merchant Merzbow performing as the perfect quartet. At 35 minutes, the opening “Feedbacker” is a slow-building epic that redefines the term “leisurely.” At five minutes into the piece, little has moved; in the sixth minute the apocalypse begins. It’s perfect black-light material, a soundtrack for nights spent either in solitude or at Halloween-themed parties. “Black Out” further explores feedback and discordance, with “Evil Stack” playing like full-tilt, grinding free metal. On what’s considered the album’s second half, Boris breaks out the more conventional tunes, with the Stooges-like garage pummel of “Pink,” the quick-paced punk gnarl of “Woman on the Screen," and the early-'70s hard rock grind of “A Bao a Qu.” The expanded works—“The Evil One Which Sobs” and “Just Abandoned My-Self”—are further proof that Boris can do anything it wishes with all forms of hard rock, post-punk, no wave, and psychedelia.