SUPER ROOTS 6

Part Six of the Boredoms' grand experiment known as the Super Roots series, staging the band's gradual metamorphosis from post-hardcore to a thoroughly original take on cosmic space rock. The prior chapter, Super Roots 5, was a major breakthrough in the band's sea change, taking their sound to new levels of bigness and exploring realms of explosive noise. Super Roots 6 is about as different from that as it could be.

Having exploded their sound in all directions, Boredoms now examined the microcosm of their sound, and set to work experimenting with the smaller details. This "EP" is still well over 60 minutes long, but it consists entirely of short pieces, each a mini-experiment in widening the band's range of sounds and styles. It's a very low-key affair, yet comes across as a very solid avant rock instrumental album on its own, despite its status as a collection of experiments. Underlining the "workshop" nature of this release is the fact that each of the tracks bears only a number as its name (and it doesn't even correspond to the track number, giving me an idea for a Boredoms'-inspired "who's on first?" skit: "What's track three called?" "6" "No, not track 6, 3!" "No, 3 is track 5".. and so on).

This album is less striking than Super Roots 5, but equally important, as it helped shape the details of band's sound as they neared the inevitable breakthrough album "Super Ae" (1998), which was presumably the culmination towards which the entire Super Roots experiment had been leading. It enabled the band to avoid the trap of being a one-trick-pony, and ensured that their career renaissance would truly sound like little that had come before.