Sitting somewhere between the triple sonic peaks of post-punk rebellion, post-hardcore intensity, and emo outsiderdom, Sorry Holly makes a big and often anthemic sound. Raw guitars litter the landscape, big choruses shake the earth, riffs roar, and you get the feeling that when played live, this music would be as much about feeling its impact as it would be about hearing it, a dynamic balance of muscle and melody, brains, and brawn.
Just drop the virtual needle on the digital record, and you are greeted with a sonic tsunami in the form of “Earth Tones and Pastels,” but listen closer, and their secret is revealed. Yes, there are the incendiary sounds I described above, but you quickly realize that this is much more than just walls of noise and that those high-impact acoustics are themselves built of taut sonic bundles of riff and hooks, motifs and melodic, that they are forged of many layers, various weaves of tones and textures, which when taken as a whole are big, yes, but also ornate, raw but eloquent, brutalist, but in their quintessential way, beautiful.
There are moments of reprieve, such as the singer-songwriter opening of “Caucy-Euler,” but even that quickly heads into some sky-searing territory once it has made its point.
“SJC” is pop-punk, if pop-punk hadn’t decided to remain a lowest common denominator, frat-boy fad, “Tenderly Loving” is an excellent metal/post-punk collision point and “How Fast Are You Going?” takes that abrasive groove first laid down by the likes of The Stooges and gives it a hardcore makeover for the modern age.
“Sorry Holly” reminds us that making big music doesn’t mean it can’t be clever too, and Use Your Heart is full of songs that are cleverer than they might appear on the first spin. So, like all great albums, the more you play it, the more rewarding it becomes.
