Boris played Paradise Rock Club – 9/11

Japan’s shapeshifting metal stalwarts Boris returned to the Paradise earlier this month with support from NYC’s Uniform. 

You might call Boris something like The Fall of metal world – always different, always the same. From their drone-y-est excursions to their stoner-doom rippers and every J-pop diversion or Merzbow collab in between, the enduring trio of Takeshi, Wata and Atsuo have explored innumerable sonic identities while still sounding unmistakably like themselves. And whatever your take on their latest release, they’ve remained an essential live act, too.

Last Wednesday’s show at the Paradise came in advance of LφVE & EVφL, the band’s first for Third Man Records, and the set previewed a few new tracks along with some recent years’ setlist staples and surprises. Third Man is also handling this year’s long-awaited vinyl reissues of 2003’s Akuma No Uta and Feedbacker, and the evening’s highlights undoubtedly revolved around rare performances of the (abbreviated) Feedbacker epic and Akuma‘s title track, where openers Uniform joined in to whip the crowd into an ecstatic frenzy.

Uniform’s opening set exhibited a similar manic energy, as the industrially-minded noise rock trio always do. Rarely will a band one has caught a number of times in a number of ordinary rock clubs make a set feel dangerous, but there’s something just unhinged enough about Uniform’s frantic missives to make it so. That they opened the U.S. tour after Boris were joined by the similarly apocalyptic Endon feels like no coincidence.

Check out photos from both sets below.