Hold on to your hats — it’s Holy Fuck! The Canadian organi-tech foursome shimmies its way into FallFest’s opening slot, showcasing Toronto’s weirder and wilder side as a tasty complement to the Game’s main course. The story behind these indie blast-beat connoisseurs is clean and vintage: They envisioned HF as a live, warm instrumental contrast to the heaps of stale electronic outfits populating the Canuck club scene.
Instead of having serious stare-downs with their laptops, the group’s stage presence is wily and unpredictable, applying a kitchen-sink approach to its musical repertoire. Brian Borcherdt and Graham Walsh each man a massive table covered in mini-Casios and assorted analog gear — none of the band’s sound comes from a computer screen.
On tracks like “Royal Gregory,” the members even incorporate ad-lib squelches by yanking film through a 35-mm film synchronizer. Matts McQuaid and Schulz helm bass guitar and drums, respectively, serve as the Owen Biddle and Questlove of the indie-dance genre.
Fun is the endgame for Fuck, as heard through the krautrock-meets-Fatboy Slim buoyancy of “Milkshake”, which sounds improvised but stays on course with its distorted yelps and throb-bass framework
Just think: our precious student fees are going to a Canadian collective with the word Fuck in its name.
It really does’t get better than that.