Latin by Holy Fuck
LABEL: Young Turks

You can't deny that Holy Fuck is a pretty ballsy thing to name your band.

Luckily for them, they easily backed up their choice of name with a bombastic debut album full of aggressive synth rock, and a reputation for putting on seizure-inducing live shows.

Holy Fuck’s new album, Latin, is quieter and more restrained then their first or second release, but also far more sophisticated. To my ears, it sounds like they’re undergoing the same sort of evolution towards looser and more creative music that Ratatat has, though the two bands styles are worlds apart.

“I’d say Latin is the band’s best so far. Nearly every song is interesting in its own way, from the squelching distortion on ”˜SHT MTN’ to the frenetic power of ”˜Stilettos.’”

Latin opens with four minutes of mostly static noise—the first attempt at atmospherics Holy Fuck has made, as far as I can recall. It’s all a big fake-out though, as it builds up and then nonchalantly cuts out to the bass-driven funk grooves of “Red Light,” a song that is seemingly impossible not to dance too.

The rest of the album is eminently danceable as well, in a meat-headed sort of way, as can probably be expected from a band that has been called “the foremost purveyors of unintelligent dance music.” These are songs for when you have to get somewhere an hour away, and you only have 30 minutes.

Holy Fuck, of course, has always been about dancing—but with Latin the band’s approach to how it makes you do it has changed. The addition of a permanent drummer and bassist has grounded the more bizarre synth explorations, and the entire album propels along like the manic orchestrations of some dark-tinged jam band. There is hardly a quiet or slow moment on the whole album, though there are enough change-ups in the tempo to keep things from getting stale.

I’d say Latin is the band’s best so far. Nearly every song is interesting in its own way, from the squelching distortion on “SHT MTN” to the frenetic power of “Stilettos.” That the band has been able to remain creative and loose while at the same time reigning in the wild highs and lows of their earlier albums is pretty impressive—I can't wait to see what they do on the next one.


REVIEWED BY MAT LINDENBERG
MAT’S FAVORITE TRACKS: “SHT MTN” • “Red Light” • “Positive Ghosts”
Read more from Mat on his blog, Everything is Unnecessary



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