Boargazm - The Backoning

My first impression of Boargazm was that they are just another alternative metal act. Boargazm is a 4-piece band from Pretoria and I admit I am oblivious to decent metal from Pretoria and I do not think Boargazm is per se a metal band. The Slipknot-esque influence on most of the songs and the varying arrangements of a noise band, makes me purposefully steer away from bottling them into a genre. Whatever they are, their album is full of it and it starts with the very graphic album art.

The Baconing is the follow up album to their first album The Aporkalypse. The 9 songs on The Baconing averages on 3:20 a song, which exposes a template of conceptual planning on the album. The drums that are recorded live on the album gives a raw dynamic to the songs.

The Intro is a mediocre 30 seconds wasted. Underverse follows as a lively song with groovy riffs. I assume the ‘underverse’ reference is from the Chronicles of Riddick. An underverse is a constellation of dark, new stars. The song that follows, Rebel Slave is my favourite song. With a lot of Slipknot influence, the pounding riffs and queer sludge sounds are unfortunately undermined by the escalating harmonic vocals on the chorus.

In Days of Yore carries the album with Slipknot-ish screams and sounds, ending with the guitars fading from left-to-right to give a nice effect. Of Mice and Men is another lively track, that starts with faint pig squeals. The instrumental track that follows, Breach starts with a weird intro and is an overall weird song. One could mistake it for an Evanescance track. The longest track on the album brings the momentum of the album to a near halt. There are ascending melodies that thickens the song a bit.

Star Overseer has chugging riffs, switching to wailing screams that powers the way to an erratic verse. The song contains a unique bass solo. Ideals of a Fool features Herman le Roux from Juggernaught, who provides weird blues hooks on the song. Ending the song with pig squeals.

Not gonna get us is a Tatu cover and can just rightly fuck off! It is silly to have it as track 9 on an 11 track record. It fucks with the composition of the album. There is a weird solo fused over the original hooks of the song. The best thing about this song is the fart and snot sounds at the end. Empire of Doom contains solid bass riffs and is an overall good song, I like the crashing vocals on the verse. Aftermath as an outro is utterly irrelevant.

Live, their stage presence occupies more space than four people tend to. I rate them as the type you want to have a braai with. At both shows that I saw them perform at, they held their own with the best punk and metal bands in the Western Cape. Live, Cicero Carstens accomplishes triplet slaps on the bass with ease. Jason Hinch playing drums, also performs for the Black Cat Bones and Chris Danger Thundervolt, the second guitarist plays bass for Dead Lucky, as well as the Black Cat Bones.

I am indifferent to the pig masks and the overall leitmotif of the aporkalypse. They have an amazing stage presence and are known for wild antics such as jumping higher than they should. I rate they will always be uncomfortably cramped on the metal stage at festivals; but would just be as ill-fitted on a main stage.

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