After blazing the trail for a cavalcade of indie dance-punk imitatorswith 2000's debut, the bi-coastal ensemble of !!! have only just nowreleased a follow-up. It's been a long four years, especially in termsof dance music and in the political climate, but with Louden Up Now,!!! have impressively bounced back from their recording lull with amasterful album. The title's imperative, followed by the group name'striple-shot of aggressive punctuation, conveys a forcefulness andurgency wholly appropriate to the agitated, edgy material on the album.Though the cover art displays an innocuous bright blue sky filled withoverlapping jet streams of exclamation points, the album itself isintensely political, violently so. Perhaps !!! are encouraging us tolouden our dissenting voices (or louden our dissenting music) until itfills the sky. In our current dystopian state of moralism, civilrights-backsliding and imperialist wars, it's unclear how a set ofexpletive-filled provocations to "pump up the volume and dance" canhelp, but that doesn't stop vocalist Nic Offer from trying. "U can tellthe president 2 suck my fucking dick" and "all U fucking squares bettersay your fucking prayers" are among some of the colorful metaphorsemployed in the lyrics, which shout down Bush, Blair, Giuliani,Christianity and censorship with equal zeal. The music is denselyproduced, with smoother edges than their previous work. It henceforthhas less of a live feel than the first album, with many elementssounding decidedly more synthetic. That said, I recently saw them playsome of this material live, and they pull it off quite well without theuse of a pre-programmed laptop. !!! continue to incorporate the richlydetailed dub-influenced sound of their sister band Out Hud, while stillmaintaining a jagged dissonance distinctly their own. Other than the"Giuliani" single, all of the tracks on Louden are newrecordings, with "Shit Scheisse Merde" forming the 15-minutecenterpiece, a three-part epic that travels from super-sexualizedPrince-influenced funk to the very heights of Giorgio Moroder disco tothe Dionysian depths of drugged-out club music. It's an incrediblydecadent sound, the throbbing bassline riding along to the pulse offrenzied, adrenaline-pumped, sweat-drenched human dancing. Elsewhere onthe album, Offer assures us that he doesn't "give a fuck" or "a shitabout that motherfucking shit," but I don't believe it. I believe hecares deeply, as his vituperative, politically-charged lyrics prove.!!! believe that the oncoming revolution can and will be birthed in theecstatic gyrations of dance culture, that true dissent can be nursed indarkness, and with the superlative Louden Up Now, they attempt to plant the first seed. - !!!, "Louden Up Now"
Touch and Go (US) / Warp (UK)
After blazing the trail for a cavalcade of indie dance-punk imitatorswith 2000's debut, the bi-coastal ensemble of !!! have only just nowreleased a follow-up. It's been a long four years, especially in termsof dance music and in the political climate, but with Louden Up Now,!!! have impressively bounced back from their recording lull with amasterful album. The title's imperative, followed by the group name'striple-shot of aggressive punctuation, conveys a forcefulness andurgency wholly appropriate to the agitated, edgy material on the album.Though the cover art displays an innocuous bright blue sky filled withoverlapping jet streams of exclamation points, the album itself isintensely political, violently so. Perhaps !!! are encouraging us tolouden our dissenting voices (or louden our dissenting music) until itfills the sky. In our current dystopian state of moralism, civilrights-backsliding and imperialist wars, it's unclear how a set ofexpletive-filled provocations to "pump up the volume and dance" canhelp, but that doesn't stop vocalist Nic Offer from trying. "U can tellthe president 2 suck my fucking dick" and "all U fucking squares bettersay your fucking prayers" are among some of the colorful metaphorsemployed in the lyrics, which shout down Bush, Blair, Giuliani,Christianity and censorship with equal zeal. The music is denselyproduced, with smoother edges than their previous work. It henceforthhas less of a live feel than the first album, with many elementssounding decidedly more synthetic. That said, I recently saw them playsome of this material live, and they pull it off quite well without theuse of a pre-programmed laptop. !!! continue to incorporate the richlydetailed dub-influenced sound of their sister band Out Hud, while stillmaintaining a jagged dissonance distinctly their own. Other than the"Giuliani" single, all of the tracks on Louden are newrecordings, with "Shit Scheisse Merde" forming the 15-minutecenterpiece, a three-part epic that travels from super-sexualizedPrince-influenced funk to the very heights of Giorgio Moroder disco tothe Dionysian depths of drugged-out club music. It's an incrediblydecadent sound, the throbbing bassline riding along to the pulse offrenzied, adrenaline-pumped, sweat-drenched human dancing. Elsewhere onthe album, Offer assures us that he doesn't "give a fuck" or "a shitabout that motherfucking shit," but I don't believe it. I believe hecares deeply, as his vituperative, politically-charged lyrics prove.!!! believe that the oncoming revolution can and will be birthed in theecstatic gyrations of dance culture, that true dissent can be nursed indarkness, and with the superlative Louden Up Now, they attempt to plant the first seed. -
After blazing the trail for a cavalcade of indie dance-punk imitatorswith 2000's debut, the bi-coastal ensemble of !!! have only just nowreleased a follow-up. It's been a long four years, especially in termsof dance music and in the political climate, but with Louden Up Now,!!! have impressively bounced back from their recording lull with amasterful album. The title's imperative, followed by the group name'striple-shot of aggressive punctuation, conveys a forcefulness andurgency wholly appropriate to the agitated, edgy material on the album.Though the cover art displays an innocuous bright blue sky filled withoverlapping jet streams of exclamation points, the album itself isintensely political, violently so. Perhaps !!! are encouraging us tolouden our dissenting voices (or louden our dissenting music) until itfills the sky. In our current dystopian state of moralism, civilrights-backsliding and imperialist wars, it's unclear how a set ofexpletive-filled provocations to "pump up the volume and dance" canhelp, but that doesn't stop vocalist Nic Offer from trying. "U can tellthe president 2 suck my fucking dick" and "all U fucking squares bettersay your fucking prayers" are among some of the colorful metaphorsemployed in the lyrics, which shout down Bush, Blair, Giuliani,Christianity and censorship with equal zeal. The music is denselyproduced, with smoother edges than their previous work. It henceforthhas less of a live feel than the first album, with many elementssounding decidedly more synthetic. That said, I recently saw them playsome of this material live, and they pull it off quite well without theuse of a pre-programmed laptop. !!! continue to incorporate the richlydetailed dub-influenced sound of their sister band Out Hud, while stillmaintaining a jagged dissonance distinctly their own. Other than the"Giuliani" single, all of the tracks on Louden are newrecordings, with "Shit Scheisse Merde" forming the 15-minutecenterpiece, a three-part epic that travels from super-sexualizedPrince-influenced funk to the very heights of Giorgio Moroder disco tothe Dionysian depths of drugged-out club music. It's an incrediblydecadent sound, the throbbing bassline riding along to the pulse offrenzied, adrenaline-pumped, sweat-drenched human dancing. Elsewhere onthe album, Offer assures us that he doesn't "give a fuck" or "a shitabout that motherfucking shit," but I don't believe it. I believe hecares deeply, as his vituperative, politically-charged lyrics prove.!!! believe that the oncoming revolution can and will be birthed in theecstatic gyrations of dance culture, that true dissent can be nursed indarkness, and with the superlative Louden Up Now, they attempt to plant the first seed. - 
