Holy Fuck/Buck 65
Electric Ballroom, London
15/11/2010
 
It’s always a good sign when both bands on a gig bill are worth catching, and tonight that’s certainly the case. Buck 65‘s been around for aeons, yet, despite consistently brilliant material and even a dalliance with a major label, has fallen short of infiltrating the mainstream. Undeterred, his style remains unaltered – witty, sharply-observed rap with a wry smile, comfortably clear of the piss-poor comedy hip-hop of Goldie Lookin’ Chain, and with delivery somewhere between Beck and Eminem. He’s a one-off, and he’s a supreme entertainer, as is evident tonight – in front of 200 or so who appear to be here for Mr 65. In many ways he’s the perfect warm-up, though the flipside of his role is that his set is limited to the standard thirty mins or so – but a brilliant half an hour it surely is.

Holy Fuck have established themselves on the downside of post-rock, with added keyboards making them closer to Errors or Salaryman in truth than your Godspeeds and Mogwais - though they retain the atmospherics and the quiet/loud dynamic of the latter pair. Bands of their ilk are usually incendiary live outfits, and Holy Fuck are no exception – their four-man set-up never offering any let-up from the wall of sound it generates, with the keyboard-led rhythms driving their offering. Where they really take off is when the second keyboardist takes up guitar duties, adding an extra layer of white noise that takes it up a couple of levels to the kind of floor-shaking output synonymous with My Bloody Valentine and showing what a fearsome live band they really are.

Crucially, they steer clear of accusations of being one-dimensional, as is often the case in this domain, and they’re also engaging visually with their agitated collective demeanour.

The proof, though is in the reaction of the crowd, and the crowd are in raptures – illustrating just how special Holy Fuck are.
 
Andy Slocombe