Cuffs and Collars
Fuck Buttons blast their nihilistic beat way past eleven
“We,” says Andrew Hung of Fuck Buttons, “are sound fascists”. As the name of his band suggests, he isn’t entirely serious. Or indeed accurate; if a controversial label must be applied to their approach to sound they are clearly “white-noise supremacists”. Formed in Bristol in 2004, the duo, consisting of Hung and Benjamin John Power, plays what Hung describes as “nihilistic noise,” a ferocious weltanschauung of drone, shoegaze and post-rock.
Read On...
Like most successful fascists, they are disdainful of the practical conventions of their contemporaries. Among their many laptops and electronics, the pair’s only traditional instruments are charity-shop kids’ toys with circuits bent, broken and wired through distortion pedals. Vocals, when they appear, are distorted beyond recognition. Though Ben lists only “the loud and the free” as an influence, they are clearly caught somewhere between My Bloody Valentine and Sunn O))). Fuck Buttons sound like God blowing his nose in slow motion.
What sets Fuck Buttons apart is an ability to express this sweeping abrasion as euphoria, not dread. The recent single “Bright Tomorrow” starts with a steady sheet-metal of feedback, then opens a slowly yawning chasm. A melody is eventually revealed, a simple battered nursery rhyme that repeats throughout. “There’s definitely an emotional element to it,” says Andy. “An idealism.”
This idealism is amplified beyond belief through a live sound system. On stage, facing each other over a table messy with gadgetry, the two perform more by telepathy than eye contact, creating a deafening noise that resonates with captured, looped screams. It’s simultaneously uplifting and chaotic, a bizarre half-gig, half-club atmosphere that leaves the audience torn between dancing and covering their ears. As Ben says, they play “as loud as it’ll go.”
Having quit their day jobs and signed to ATP Recordings, the boys’ 2008 is looking increasingly bright. Their debut LP, Street Horrrsing, is out this month. Produced by members of Part Chimp and Mogwai, it is sure to be as loud as it is weird.
Street Horrrsing is out February 11 on ATP.
www.myspace.com/fuckbuttons
By Tom King Written for the lovely people at Tank Magazine...
Forza Tank.
“We,” says Andrew Hung of Fuck Buttons, “are sound fascists”. As the name of his band suggests, he isn’t entirely serious. Or indeed accurate; if a controversial label must be applied to their approach to sound they are clearly “white-noise supremacists”. Formed in Bristol in 2004, the duo, consisting of Hung and Benjamin John Power, plays what Hung describes as “nihilistic noise,” a ferocious weltanschauung of drone, shoegaze and post-rock.
Read On...
Like most successful fascists, they are disdainful of the practical conventions of their contemporaries. Among their many laptops and electronics, the pair’s only traditional instruments are charity-shop kids’ toys with circuits bent, broken and wired through distortion pedals. Vocals, when they appear, are distorted beyond recognition. Though Ben lists only “the loud and the free” as an influence, they are clearly caught somewhere between My Bloody Valentine and Sunn O))). Fuck Buttons sound like God blowing his nose in slow motion.
What sets Fuck Buttons apart is an ability to express this sweeping abrasion as euphoria, not dread. The recent single “Bright Tomorrow” starts with a steady sheet-metal of feedback, then opens a slowly yawning chasm. A melody is eventually revealed, a simple battered nursery rhyme that repeats throughout. “There’s definitely an emotional element to it,” says Andy. “An idealism.”
This idealism is amplified beyond belief through a live sound system. On stage, facing each other over a table messy with gadgetry, the two perform more by telepathy than eye contact, creating a deafening noise that resonates with captured, looped screams. It’s simultaneously uplifting and chaotic, a bizarre half-gig, half-club atmosphere that leaves the audience torn between dancing and covering their ears. As Ben says, they play “as loud as it’ll go.”
Having quit their day jobs and signed to ATP Recordings, the boys’ 2008 is looking increasingly bright. Their debut LP, Street Horrrsing, is out this month. Produced by members of Part Chimp and Mogwai, it is sure to be as loud as it is weird.
Street Horrrsing is out February 11 on ATP.
www.myspace.com/fuckbuttons
By Tom King Written for the lovely people at Tank Magazine...
Forza Tank.
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