Holy Hounds

Checked out Holy Hounds. Not too shabby. Reminds me of Dr. Dog. If you haven't checked them out yet, I suggest you do. Seems like you'd be into it. I think Holy Hounds needs a little more dynamics in vocal melody.. but has potential.

- A&R, Sony BMG - A&R - Sony BMG

September 11, 2008
Author: Justin Hinkley

The guys from Holy Hounds hope to take their listeners out of this world and into a darker, more menacing one: from earth and into a crooked cabaret, a villainous, vaudeville realm of crazies and crooks.

“A lot of our songs have to do with outlaws and criminals and murders, the not-so-pleasant people of the world from their viewpoint,” said Benji Bloodbath, one-half of the Holy Hounds lineup. “You know when you read a book and you can visualize what’s going on in your head? I want the lyrics from our songs to have that sort of effect.”

“We just want to create a completely different world,” said Matthew Dead, the other half. “All the songs go hand-in-hand together and create a story.”

On the band’s debut E.P., the five-track, independently-released “Murder City Limits,” the band weaves tales of woe and misfortune to the tune of Tom Waits-style gritty folk-blues. It’s a sound caught somewhere between the Great Depression-era music of the Dust Bowl and the grainy, black-and-white horror flicks of the 1940s.

“Our music is folksy, but at the same time it has a lot of elements of blues worked into it,” Bloodbath said. “And a lot of old rockabilly like Carl Perkins and Johnny Cash. But we kind of made it a lot grittier.”

“We’re drawn to more of the out-there kind of bands, we definitely try to stick out,” Dead said.

The album, released in July, is driven by the minor-key, eerie earthiness of acoustic guitars, backed by soundtracks of a basement world: here a B-movie scream from the distance, there a hammer and nails for percussion, here the sound of someone clearing their throat of cigarette phlegm.

“There’s no drums on the album,” Dead said. “We just went into my garage and found things that made cool sounds when you hit them together.”

The duo started writing music together years ago, often in other bands with a heavy feel. However, the musicians said they always had a love for folk music and would frequently play sidewalk shows, just the two of them and two acoustic guitars.

In June, the pair decided to go full-time with the folk tunes and Holy Hounds was formed.

The band, unsigned, has earned many gigs across the Battle Creek-Kalamazoo-Grand Rapids scene by making connections with bands with similar sounds, what Dead called “outside bands.”

For now, the pair is happy playing small shows, big shows, any shows, and just hopes to keep the music going.

“We want to go as far as we possibly can,” Dead said, “and take everything that comes at us, all the shows. We just love playing out, it doesn’t matter if it’s in a basement or opening for somebody huge.”


- Battle Creek Enquirer Newspaper