LISTEN:
‘INCEST IN THE HERD’
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When Atlanta-based rock band Holy Beach play, they send lightning bolts of energy hurtling through the ether to either fizzle or explode. Formed early this year, Holy Beach are not making any dainty debuts — they’re making an anthemic antithesis to the serpentine soundscape of post-rock, shooting out fast from the starting line. Their first full-length record, All That Matters Is This Matter, releasing this summer and co-produced by platinum award winning engineer Jeff Leonard Jr. (who has worked with bands including Shinedown, Sleeper Agent, and Framing Hanley), is rich with the guzzled, cloudy waves of grunge interspersed with smashes of raging rock. The album marks the first official effort from Holy Beach, but its members are no strangers to the industry.
Holy Beach was born out of an uncertain kind of certainty. John Lally, lead vocalist and guitarist for shoegaze group Sleep Therapy, found that the material spilling out of him wasn’t quite suited for the dreamy haze of Sleep Therapy’s typical discography. He didn’t know where his new work might fit, but he knew it had to make sense somewhere. Aided by friends Jon Hilton (of Us Prizms), Mike Gibbs (of Krem Love), and Jason Petty all on warring guitars, Kevin Faivre on bass, and Jordan Hershaft (of The Tens) on percussion, Lally sources a killer lineup from the bursting Southern music scene. The result is Holy Beach, a sextet ready to rock, rage, and reflect.
Recorded at Atlanta’s Tree Sound Studios and Cassida Studios, All That Matters Is This Matter is expertly produced, a collection of eight soaring hard-rock tracks that flutter in the atmospheric realm. When Holy Beach kick off the record with “Ships Off The Coast,” they come in hot. Built on a wild cacophony of fiery percussion and searing guitar riffs, it’s a dynamic introduction to a band brand new but already working to weave their way to the front of the rock scene. Later, on songs like “The New Colossus,” things remain weighed down by thick grunge fuzz but there’s an underlying layer of earnest emotion that can be heard in Lally’s aching vocal delivery or the instrumental unity so robust, so full, so teeming with power and togetherness.
Holy Beach have just taken the first step in a series of footprints that will leave their mark on Atlanta’s experimental music scene. Armed with the angst of your favorite eerie troubadours and the sonic prowess of electric post-rock elements, Holy Beach move onwards towards something special — something akin to dark magic.
Artist: Holy Beach
Album: All That Matters Is This Matter
Label: Ursa Minor Records
Release Date: June 28, 2019
1. Ships Off The Coast
2. Fade Away
3. It’s The Fear
4. Confident Prick
5. Incest In The Herd
6. International Graves
7. The New Colossus
8. Skull Faced On A Horse