Good Goddamn, it's about time. The beginning of 2004 shall be riddled with great albums from such artists as the Catheters and Lightning Bolt, but Hella will start us off with a bang.
The Devil Isn't Red is Hella's return to the indie two-man group of Hold Your Horse Is that stole me and Zed's collective hearts a year and a half ago (it came out earlier, but we didn't find out until then).
I love this new album and I love this band for the following reasons:
-They're only a two-piece, which makes communication far easier and gives them a chance to really switch up the beats whenever they feel like it (which they do a lot) without ruining the fluidity.
-They make the listener earn the sweet parts of the album like eating the crust of a loaf of bread and then the sweet, soft innards, which makes for a well-balanced and amiable album.
-The focus is on the talent and panache of drummer Zach Hill and exuberance of guitarist Spencer Seim, who together, make some sort of hyper-band and it's such a relief to hear a band that not only focuses on what they're best at, but has two incredibly talented musicians at both positions played.
Although this isn't entirely instrumental (Spencer fucks around with some toys in this one as well), it's much better than the two EPs released. For example: in the first song on the album, titled "Hello Great Architect of the Universe," the instrumentals are a priority to the electronica stuff.
But the song as a whole is well constructed. Not only that, but the album is well constructed, almost in the same fashion of Hold Your Horse Is; the CD starts off with a tiny intro, then onto some badass music that everyone has to move to, then some troubling and complex music, then some weird stuff and then the finale, which is both grand and beautiful.
I'm getting tired of pointing the specifics out; just believe me on this one. I mean, c'mon. It's Hella.
The point is, this album is already atop my "best of" list for the 6 month point at least (and I have high expectations for this coming 6 months). And although this may be hard for you to grasp, just do yourself a favor: go out, buy this record (when it's available), and love the hell out of it.
