I grabbed hold of Holy Fuck's debut album this afternoon and was really impressed with it. First up, the album has a really live feel to it; not only are the tracks on the album recorded live, the production is pretty raw. This really gives the music an unpredictable edge, true to their powerful live shows.

Brian Borcherdt explained last week (see here) that they recorded the record in just 2 days, simply showing up at a studio, setting up their equipment and recording the music that happened to materialize. I got a strong sense, listening to the album, that the group were pretty pumped on these particular 2 days since the tracks that came out are seriously charged. Perhaps they'd just got a hefty parking ticket. Perhaps they'd had an argument about how best to wire up their impressive mound of equipment (should the delay pedal come after or before the 60's fuzz box?). Perhaps there wasn't any sugar to put in their coffee and that really made them mad. Perhaps they'd forgotten to bring in their lunchbox and that made them hungry as well as mad (never a good combo).

Who knows. Whatever the reason it's made for some truly great music. In places this album gets fantastically chaotic - take a listen to Bontempi Latin for example or K Rhythm pt 2!!! Yet despite such franticness it always feels totally in control. This is partly down to the drumming which does an excellent job of keeping everything well glued together even in the albums most mental moments. It's also down to an excellent understanding the band members share between themselves. They each know intuitively where an idea's heading, when it's going to build, subside and break down. They're supremely confident at playing off each other and, as a result, aren't afraid to take risks and push their monstrous jamming sessions to extremes.

It's this understanding which makes such a risky album such a success.

The debut Holy Fuck album was released today and is available to order from Dependent Music