Until Lady Gaga does a Bowie covers tour with Cirque de Soleil, no gig could be less predictable than an evening with Osaka’s Japanoise legends Boredoms. Feted by the 90s US grungerati and now celebrated as art noise pioneers, their performances have involved beating evil cacophonies out of seven-necked guitars, ambient sets triggered by motion sensors and, recently exploring the possibilities of mass percussion, a ring of 88 cymbal players on a giant Simon Says machine. So when at the start of this unnamed new 80-minute piece, Yamantaka Eye, Yoshimi P-We and Yojiro Tatekawa circle the stage swinging thin rod chimes hung from overhead stands, nothing’s certain bar the nosebleeds.
After 20 minutes of minimalist chime work building to what sounds like Storm Katie hitting Glastonbury’s Tipi Field, Eye summons bursts of excoriating static with a clench of his fist. Precision-tooled chaos ensues. Segments variously evoke arcane rituals, off-kilter tattoos, disjointed ragas, deafening alien reggae and synth Scalextric. At one point, Eye’s electronically stuttered muezzin wails resemble Doors master tapes fed through a mincer and reassembled backwards, at another a tribal forest chase appears to fall loudly off a cliff. A video feed shows someone playing buckets of vibrating crockery with a fish slice. Bedlam conducts, in 4/π time.
Rather than pummel you with their hell-clatter until you soil yourself or leave, Boredoms temper the art of volume with atmospheric restraint. As the piece finally coheres into a euphoric drone rock climax, they’re as engrossing as avant-noise gets without invoking the usual “hypnotic state” hokum. Boredoms remain unbound.
