“Ant 10,” the single song on Super Roots 10, the latest release by Japanese electro-noisers Boredoms, is an exhilarating rush of guttural, wordless vocals, spiraling synth arpeggios, pummeled tribal percussion, and pounding four-to-the-floor bass drums. While far more accessible than the ecstatic forty-minute minimalist opus that comprised their last release, Super Roots 9, “Ant 10” is similarly constructed of intense dance beats cut with spastic percussion breakdowns and ornamented with repetitive synth figures, fuzzy electronics, and electric piano. The result is a piece that stimulates your head as much as it does your desire to dance, whether it be with the innumerable layers and electronic textures that take endless listens to dissect, the infectious primal drumming and tempos shifting, or the killer distorted synth solo at the center of the piece.
The rest of Super Roots 10 is comprised of “Super Rooy,” thirty-seven seconds of John Cage-like silence and almost inaudible bass rumble that act as an introduction to the album, and four remixes of “Ant 10.” Japanese DJ Altz contributes two remixes that stay fairly true to the original, but with an emphasis placed on pitch and rhythmic manipulation of the piece’s vocal shouts and new but subtle synth coloring. DJ Finger Hat shaves the piece down to just over five minutes and places it before a backdrop of bouncing contrapuntal keyboard and shimmering electro textures. The strongest remix comes from Scandinavian DJ Lindstrom, who reinvents the piece as an infectious and exhilarating funk disco number almost unrecognizable from the original. A rollercoaster ride of funky clavichord, antiphonal keyboard hits, and distorted post-rock synth figures, Lindstrom’s contribution stands as well as a stand-alone original as it does a reinterpretation and illustrates inventive remixing at its best.
While listening to five versions of the same song is a bit exhausting, Super Roots 10 is a fantastic and surprisingly varied listen that illuminates the oft abstract and inaccessible Boredoms through a prism of intense dance-y and uplifting interpretations. That “Ant 10” is strong enough to support so many innovative remixes while standing alone so strongly is a testament to the band’s influence and unique ability to marry experimental tendencies with crowd-pleasing dance music.
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