Yamantaka // Sonic Titan at the Mercury Lounge

In the footprints of the Boredoms, Acid Mothers Temple and Boris, Japanese post-metal tends to exhibit a skewed idea of heavy metal, along the lines of what J-art scholars could imagine Black Sabbath to sound like from the cover of Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. Yamantaka // Sonic Titan, a Canadian septet of art school students, distinguish themselves by sounding like a band of metalheads imagining themselves as Japanese artists. Their name comes from a Buddhist deity and a Sleep song, and their music comes from another cosmos.

Entering the room in silence and war paint, Yamantaka // Sonic Titan took the stage with a set of high school-level stage props that accumulated into transcendence once the band entered, walking through the crowd under a hand-crafted dragon. Their instruments were disguised with decorated sheets and foamcore clouds, and the band was adorned in costumes that ranged from geishas to shredded garbage bags. Starting at their quietest, with the childlike "Queens," they worked their way into a noisy whirlwind on tracks like "Reverse Crystal // Murder of a Spider" and "Hoshi Neko," the latter evoking Wendy Carlos and Trent Reznor hosting a Ukiyo-e show.

Despite their DIY production, YT // ST think big. They eschew rock n' roll spontaneity in favor of a rehearsed, calculated production on a punk rock budget. The meshing of values makes for a show as idiosyncratic as their music, and by the end of their set, I felt like I had just survived a hurricane. They had played for about 40 minutes.

Openers Yvette played a promising, effects-heavy form of noise rock.

Acid Mothers Temple at the Mercury Lounge

"Last Tour in US & Canada" read the t-shirts at the Mercury Lounge's merch booth. Of course, these things have a way of changing, but for an underground band like Acid Mothers Temple dealing with the cost of flying over from Japan, it's a claim worth taking seriously.



It'll be the States' loss. AMT are best in the flesh, boiling down their unwieldy discography to its best songs and gracing their experiments with a mesmerizing performance. Songs that create a stoner background on tape catapult into a sampler-heavy improv, where Hawkwind is king and recorders are cool. Clad in Druid wear, and offering no hint that any of them had ever seen This is Spinal Tap, Acid Mothers Temple employed space rock riffage from planet free-psych to create a gnarly two-hour riff cycle.

Unlike nearly every American drone-metal act, there are no pretenses in the Temple. Rather than fall into Stephen O'Malley's real-metal-is-too-stupid-for-me shtick, Acid Mothers Temple are unabashed fans of their art. Like a psychedelic Guided by Voices, AMT perform like a middle-aged team of average Joes pretending to be rock stars in a garage after their 9-5s, practicing Ritchie Blackmore's stage moves while looking like they've raided his closet. The audience, exactly the kind of folks you'd expect to pick up acid rock vinyls with 20-minute songs, hung on to every note.

Openers The Phantom Family Halo played a likable form of alt-psychedelic rock, following a Jesus-pushing noise rocker whose act stopped being interesting when irony kicked in.