Album Review - Think I Need The Light by Holy Now (2018) (Lazy Octopus Records)

I got married at the age of thirty. Prior to that I was a committed bachelor enjoying the simple pleasures of life such as regular gigs, beers with mates, football at the weekends and being a serial monogamist in a number of long(ish) term relationships. Several of these ended due to what certain ex-beau's referred to as my 'commitment issues'.

I was not immune to heart break though. Two ladies especially gave me that long lasting feeling in the pit of your stomach that only 'love grief' can provide. However, within weeks I was usually pretty much over it due to the start of a new relationship or just because the possibilities provided by being single again were usually enjoyed to excess. As such I could never understand 'mates' whose break up grief lasted beyond the point of general relatively short term maudlin..

This is perhaps why indie-pop has appealed to me such over the years. For this particular genre, whilst often concentrating on all things 'break-up' tends to do so in a manner that explores the intellectual complexities of the emotion involved in lost love (or at least the idealistic notion of it) rather than merely dwelling on the all consuming 'feelings' of it in the way that much Post-Punk insisted upon suicide as a viable option. As such numerous bands, led by the Sarah Records bands of the late 1980's / early 1990s, forged an indelible aesthetic that has acted as something of a template for indie-pop and its forages through the intellectualism of love.

Of late Holy Now have become torch bearers for the continuation of this movement. Think I Need the Light has two main indie-pop nuances which are portrayed brilliantly on this release. Initially the homage to all things Sarah Records is seen in abundance with tracks such as Tainted Heart, Glowing and the superlative  Feel It All (see below). However the fundamental difference between all thing Sarah and Holy Now is that the beautiful fluttered, emotive jangle-pop template is accentuated by the truly crystalline fully formed vocals of Julie Olander, rather than choosing to adopt the usual deadpan hushed delivery of many Sarah bands. 

Feel It All

However Holy Now, no matter how persuasive Olander's voice is, are far more that an indie-pop 'one trick pony'. As can be seen in tracks such as Toronto and the superbly developed Something Real (see below) they are quite capable of avoiding any sense of uniformity in the album by adding more muscle to tracks, to such an extent that shoegaze may well have been the nearest genre reference point if was not for an ever pervasive sense of melody. Either way, they do 'muscle' just as well as they do the 'flutter jangle' of their foundation sound.

Holy Now may not be the quirkiest of indie pop bands and as such they are never going to satisfy the most committed of young music snobs. However, for those that have grown out of the need for quirks, this band are certainly the most classy traditional indie poppers skipping through mild heartbreak at present.

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