BXI
BXI EP
Southern Lord

BXI, better read as Boris + Ian, is a seemingly odd collaboration between Japanese experimental/stoner/metal/drone/doom giants, Boris, and everyone’s favourite spiritual tambourine shaker (when he’s not wearing a track suit and pretending to be Jim Morrison, that is), Ian Astbury. Personally though, I was stoked when the news first dropped about this hook-up because it seemed to me that throwing a huge stack of noise behind the salty ol’ shaman might actually resurrect his inner love child. I think it’s done just that. The four-song EP kicks off with “Teeth and Claws” and sure enough, Boris’ slow, deep, melodious rhythm goads Astbury’s voice into prophetic incantations about love, illumination, renewal, and salvation. Then Boris drops a brutally heavy, attacking riff on “We Are Witches” as Astbury grows larger at the pulpit, casting an army of one thousand ravens into the night. It ends, quite fittingly, with “Magickal Child,” the all-encompassing comedown, a sweetly distorted lysergic ballad full of atmospheric soul, but not before the procession is interrupted for Boris’ Astbury-less cover of The Cult’s “Rain,” which is a stand-out here thanks to its truly remarkable psychedelic pop vibe and guitarist Wata’s ghostly, porcelain voice. The power of BXI is mighty, brothers and sisters. Let it compel you.

Listen to “We Are Witches” from BXI!

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
Beat the Devil’s Tattoo
Abstract Dragon/Vagrant

Friends and I used to have discussions about who we would let into our cool club (the adult kind, not the school boy kind) if we ever owned one. The kind of place where only the hippest cats on planet earth would be allowed to drink, fuck, and create. Not that excluding people is necessarily cool, but we considered it more of a human dress code, if you will. And to be alive certainly wasn’t a prerequisite. In fact, it always turned out that the guest list created during any given discussion included mostly dead heroes. Somehow, death made you cooler. So, who would be allowed into such an exclusive club? Well, people like Neal Cassady, Pierre Trudeau, Marlon Brando, Jack Nicholson, Joe Strummer, Charles Bukowski, Sailor Jerry, Janis Joplin, and Tom Waits, that’s who. There was always an argument over whether Johnny Cash should make it in or not. Being tagged as a bible thumper has its drawbacks. Anyway, I always used to, and still do, imagine the ever-evolving line-up of house bands that would play this club. Thee Hypnotics every once in awhile. The Stooges once a week. And Black Rebel Motorcycle Club as often as possible.

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