The following is a non-exclusive interview with the Japanese break out avant garde band, Boris. Their American label, Southern Lord, conducted the interview, but we have been given access to publish it. Note, this is only a portion of a rather large write up, so if you wish to read the interview in it’s entirety, please click here.

ON BORIS BEGINNINGS:
We all went to art school together, but in the beginning we had a different drummer. He started the band, and we were really doing it for him at first. It was just for fun. Well, even now it’s still just for fun. We had no plan whatsoever. At first, I was the guitarist/singer. According to Wikipedia, that was in 1992. I don’t remember the exact year. And after a few years the drummer left, I slid into his spot and we’ve held that lineup until now.

As we started collecting more equipment, all the instruments, amps, pedals etc gave us a better sense of the real nature of sound, like how good really loud feedback sounds, you know? And in the process our stereotypes about music just sort of crumbled. We’re driven to keep going by that exploration of pure sound, by that great feeling it can give you.

ON RECORDING SMILE:
Each song has its own kind of “world view” and, taken as a whole, an album has its own similar “world view”, and as a band releases material, the sum of its work becomes the band’s overall “world view.” Once we’ve written a particular type of song it gets boring to write the same type of song, so we’re pulled in a new direction by a new “world view” and end up writing different types of songs. It’s a little hard to explain, but when we fill in the details of a particular song, we add to the general feeling of the whole album, and in return the general mood of the album influences how we detail each song.

On Smile, we were especially influenced by our previous releases. We had already released an instrumental version of “KA RE HA TE TA SA KI”, and “Smile” partly appeared on an album called Vein. In that sense, I think we did things that, when most people make an album, are considered taboo. I don’t think of Boris as a band anymore, or even as music, and along those same lines, incorporating these sorts of normally frowned upon methods feels new, and kind of thrilling. “Acceptable” sounds are surely already out there somewhere – they’ve already been turned into music – so we felt it was necessary to abandon music for the sake of a “new experience.”

I really love recording. I would love to spend all my time in the studio. During the recording of Smile we were able to do various experiments, and we had a few “failures”, and all in all it was really fun. “Musical mistakes” are very important to us, they give us a way to think outside the normal context of ‘music’ and in the end come up with a new sound. When you’re normally listening to music, you don’t really hear these “mistakes,” you know? Musicians take all the mistakes out of the music. It’s really thrilling and exciting to shape a song out of mistakes. Sometimes you end up with sounds you’ve never heard before. And on this recording we were able to incorporate “cheesy”, vulgar, frivolous elements into the music, ideas that have historically been considered off limits for “cool” music. I think most people are aware of this already, but the Japanese and worldwide versions of the album have totally different mixes, and I’m really happy with the way this helps blur any sense of “originality” for the release. I also feel like if you listen to both mixes, we’ve revealed a few of Boris’ “secrets.”

Wanting to make something new, and wanting to document our lives at the time of the recording – these elements haven’t changed. Something I was conscious of, that made this album much different than the rest, was our growing boredom with “cool” music, rock music, and the normal way of operating a so-called “band.” I think we were looking for the “experience” that lies at the root of expression, rather than just “music.” I think we were able to incorporate the discomfort and even disgust one feels when listening to “uncool” or vulgar music into Smile.

We’ve gotten to know more music as we’ve gotten older, and the sounds our bodies naturally produce go in various different directions. Our technical skill level hasn’t improved at all. All the members of the group hate practicing. We just record, listen carefully to what we’ve got to work with (including the mistakes) and in the process discover the potential in various sounds. And that’s how we’ve expanded our sound palette.

We just record whatever we’re feeling at the moment, and the song eventually communicates to us which direction it will take. And our emotions are in constant flux. I tire of things quickly. But sometimes we do leave basic tracks untouched all the way through the end of the recording process, like we did with the last song on Smile. We listened to the recording of Jam and knew it was finished. Farewell was like that too. And sometimes we focus on one section of a recording and expand on it. I think the sounds that excite us will do the same thing for others, so we just try to listen really carefully to what we record.

The recording process was pretty much the same as always. We taped a bunch of stuff, made some mistakes, listened carefully to the mistakes and found some interesting directions to go in. We recorded it ourselves like always and kept ourselves amused by trying different recording techniques. Up until recently we weren’t doing any traditional songwriting, we just recorded our jams or improvisations and built songs out of those, but by the time this recording came around we were already sick of that approach so we intentionally assembled various riffs together like puzzles, used these riffs as foundations for jams, and destroyed what we’d started with. Special for this release, we did things like building off an Aso Ai song, having Michio Kurihara and Stephen Omally guest, etc.

We can never control the direction a song takes. Listening to a sound over and over, its almost like the song tells us which direction it’d like to go…and we use our bodies to translate that message.

ON ‘STATEMENT’:
We wrote the basic structure of this song during the Pink sessions. But for some reason we didn’t finish it then. And after that, during the Pink tour, we got sick of “cool” music, and we were listening to lots of vulgar, cheesy stuff (but at the time it had a real impact on us), and we heard where we could take Statement. Hmm, I don’t know, I’m happy with all the different ways the song’s been received. I think it’s normal that everyone has different reactions to the song, since everyone has their own personal musical history. Personally, I think of it as a very modern song.

ON SMILE ART:
Southern Lord’s Stephen O’Mally designed it for us, and at the first meeting, for some reason, we were both thinking of flying objects. Maybe we both had elevation on our minds? The title and key colors were decided in advance. I designed the Japanese version. I think the heart mark is such a strong symbol, and I was into how dangerous it was. In Japan, if you put a heart mark after a sentence, it automatically takes on this really positive tone. Like even if you write, “Die ?.” I thought it would be great if I could use the heart mark to make Boris’s image even more messed up.We were totally wiped out from constant recording and touring, and the gouged out, hollow yellow heart seemed to communicate that in a direct way. But honestly I think no matter what you should be able to smile. I always feel a smile coming across my face when I look out into the audience at our shows.

ON 2 DIFFERENT VERSIONS OF SMILE:
Very simply, we just didn’t think there was any reason to limit ourselves to one “original” version. And we didn’t think we were doing anything particularly out of the ordinary this time, but I’ve been surprised by the huge reaction it’s triggered. All over the world I’ve been very surprised by this common attitude I’ve sensed, like, “There must be one and only one version of an album!!” I feel like this state of mind represents a real crisis.

PINK VS. SMILE:
Smile has a very similar composition to Pink. It starts with a slow song, then goes into a fast one, and it’s edited in a really abrupt style. It was sequenced and edited with the idea that it would be fine for people to think that, since Pink had been our biggest seller, we were trying to make something similar. The heavy touring and recording that followed Pink’s release left us emotionally and physically drained, and we were bored with “cool” music and rock music. And at the same time, the “fake” domestic, Japanese versions of imported music appeared for the first time to us as “new experiences.” We all were under the impression that that kind of music was cheesy, vulgar, sell-out music, but all of a sudden this music left a very strong impression and seemed as if it could completely slice us up, destroy us, and mangle us in a pleasant way. In the sense that we incorporated our taste and impression of this music into Smile, I suppose you could call it a “sell-out” album. I get the sense that Japanese can contribute to the world by really exploring this sense of their own culture’s fakeness. Of course, I don’t mean to say this is a uniquely Japanese phenomenon.

The song “Statement” was written during the PINK sessions, but for some reason we couldn’t finish it. But once we incorporated that “cheesiness,” we were able to finish it really quickly. All of a sudden we had lots of ideas like the falsetto singing, and the excessive overdubbing.

We got sick of so-called “cool” rock music, found ourselves really inspired by cheesy music, and I think eventually the cheesy music started to sound like true rock, or something like that…Simply put, we’re always just chasing after something that can stimulate or inspire us. For PINK, we were traveling around the world on tour, and felt like we had grasped the furthest reaches of rock, the end of an era.

ON EMBRACING ‘CHEESY’ AND OTHER INFLUENCES:
When I was a kid I listened to that kind of music in a very non-judgemental, pure way, and its still in my bones. And after lots of recording and touring, when we got tired of trying to make “cool” music, cheesy music suddenly sounded very fresh. Right off the bat, it’s a kind of “anti-music.” It’s not there as music, but instead as recorded sound for a television program, or a highly “designed” commodity, and at no point does it pretend to be real “music.” I thought that was really fresh and new.

In the context of most other music, its almost like an “accident.” So its been ignored by mainstream rock and other musical histories, and no matter which country you go to, the Heavy Metal genre is a minor, subcultural thing.

I think stuff that grates on the ears especially, as pure “sound”, has a real power. I think that’s maybe why we needed to stop making “music.” But the ridiculous sound of the 80s has become very symbolic of that era of music, and superficially at least, I guess Smile will sound like music to most listeners.

Daily life is what inspires us to keep creating. Touring, recording… all of our experiences, really. And leaving Japan for a while, then coming back to it, feeling out of sorts at times on tour, picking up on attitudes abroad that differ from your average Japanese way of thinking, all of these are experiences we’ve frequently had.I always resent coming back to Japan from tour and feeling how kind of lukewarm Japan is.

And I mentioned this before too, but being bored influences us as well. We try to let all of the things that influence us resonate or “feedback” in a positive way. We’re positive machines. Automatically positive.

ON METAL/PUNK INFLUENCE:
I think lately people don’t take you seriously unless you say you’ve grown up on punk and hardcore. Of course all of us did grow up on punk and hardcore, but I don’t want to constantly say it and have it be a marketing tool. That music is in our blood and in our bodies, so it just comes out naturally in the music we make. I think the “hardcore influence” has become a real indulgent, self-serving thing, to the point where it’s meaningless – where you can just play whatever you want. Will there ever be a phrase, or a music that’s more intense than “hardcore”? I’m really bored with “hardcore.” I think there will be more and more anti-hardcore bands in the future.