Twins of Evil: Boris and Melvins shake the walls at District Live
The earth beneath your feet will rumble, and the very air around you will surge like a tsunami when both Melvins and Boris, titans of heavy sludge metal, stoner rock, and other glorious forms of amplifier abuse, come stomping into District Live on their Twins of Evil tour.
Japan’s Boris formed in 1992 and were so indebted to Melvins’ monolithic Sabbath-guitar sound that they named themselves after the opening track of Melvins’ 1993 Bullhead album. Boris, which has been the trio of Atsuo (drums/vocals), Takeshi (bass/guitar/vocals), and Wata (guitar/keyboard/vocals) since 1996, are often mercurial and hard to pin to any one genre. They have delved into stoner, sludge, doom, psychedelic, shoegaze, ambient, noise, crust, and (confoundingly to many of their fans) J-Pop.
Boris have released over 20 albums and have often followed their muse into unexpected directions, such as when they released a dual album, Gensho(2016) with Japanese noise sorcerer Merzbow, with both records meant to be played simultaneously,sometimes to cacophonous results. Throughout their eclectic experimentations, tonal elements of drone, feedback, and resonant frequencies have remained central to Boris’ core sound.
For the Twins of Evil Tour, Boris will perform their fiery 2002 album, Heavy Rocks, in its entirety. They have actually named three of their albums Heavy Rocks over the years, but the 2002 version just received a reissue from Third Man Records.
Cult legends Melvins are currently celebrating their 40th anniversary, but don’t expect a career retrospective at this gig.
“If we played one song off each album, it would be too long,” said Melvins frontman Buzz “King Buzzo” Osbourne over the phone.
Instead, Melvins will be performing Bullhead in its entirety, at the request of Boris.
“Boris came up with this tour idea and I said, ‘Sure, we’ll do it, but we play first.’,” said Buzz. “The Bullhead album is only 37 minutes long, so we have to play more songs than just Bullhead. I don’t have an ego when it comes to that kind of stuff. I’d open the show. It doesn’t make a difference to me.”
Despite this being an anniversary, Melvins are not feeling overly nostalgic.
“It’s nice to have made it this far,” said Buzz. “I wasn’t really thinking along those lines when we originally started the band. I just wanted to play music. I didn’t have any ideas about having a career, or making an album, or anything. We surpassed our initial expectations for the band very quickly.”
Godfathers of Grunge: 'I knew we were a lot weirder than those bands'
Melvins formed in 1983 and played their earliest gigs in Olympia, Washington and then Seattle. By 1988, Melvins moved to San Francisco and never looked back, but they left an indelible mark on Northwestern music scene. Melvins are often credited as the “Godfathers of Grunge” because of their obvious influence on many of the bands that burst from the Seattle punk scene in the early '90s.
“Without u,s none of that would have ever happened,” acknowledged Buzz. “Certainly not the way it did happen. Bands like Soundgarden, and through them bands like Alice in Chains, and certainly Nirvana wouldn’t have sounded anything like what they do without us. Our influence was left in the northwest and left on the northwest, and basically changed music on a global level.”
Melvins have always been too heavy for the radio and too weird for the mainstream, but that is an okay place to be, especially considering that they’ve released over 30 albums, influenced bands like Tool, Sunn O))), Isis, Tool, Mastodon, Earth, Stone Temple Pilots, and Nirvana, and are still touring and churning out records today, all on their own terms.
Melvins have a prolific catalog of records, but they have managed to remain fresh throughout their career with experimental albums like 1992’s Melvins and 2017’s A Walk With Love and Death, KISS-inspired solo albums, guest artist collaborations, and new band configurations like their Big Business line-up.
Melvins’ metric for success is not informed by the MTV-dominating grunge movement that followed in their wake.
“It never bothered me,” said Buzz of the grunge explosion that didn’t fully include them. “I knew we were a lot weirder than those bands. It didn’t get under my skin or anything. I’ve never been jealous of anyone’s fame or fortune. I do fine and I’m not weirded out by it at all. A lot of people think I should be, or would be, and that’s just crazy. I don’t think that way. If you’re judging yourself on how other people are, you should maybe take a good look at your character, because you’ll never find me saying one thing about anybody else’s success versus my own. A lot of people are saying that about us, but I have never thought that and I think the people that pin that stuff on us, or assume that’s what we think are dastardly horrible people and I can’t imagine what their parents must be like.”
“That just shows you the stuff we’ve been up against. By and large, they don’t understand a thing about us, and they don’t do their homework, and they’ve certainly not listened to the stuff that we’ve done. We’ve done 30+ albums of material and it can’t boxed into a median sized matchbook. It can’t be. And yet, none the less, there it is.”
Melvins have been friends with Boris since their inception. The two bands first played together decades ago in Japan and look forward to embarking on this sonically massive U.S. tour together again.
“They’ve always been very nice and I know it will be an easy thing to do,” said Buzz. “It will be fun.”
Opening for Melvins and Boris are Mr. Phlyzzz, a ripping two-piece from Chicago who are part of the Amphetamine Reptile record label family.
“I’m really looking forward to it,” said Buzz of touring with Mr. Phlyzz. “I really like those guys a great deal, and I like them personally a great deal. I think they’re going to be very excited to be there, and we’re going to be very excited to have them there. That’s half the battle on tour is finding people you get along with and want to be out there with.”
If You Go >>
What: Melvins and Boris w/ Mr. Phylzzz
When: 7:30 p.m., Sept. 28
Where: District Live, 400 W. River St.
Cost: $35 advance, $39.50 at door
Info: plantriverside.com/district-live/
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Twins of Evil: Boris and Melvins shake the walls at District Live
