Reviews

Golden Hands Before God

Here

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Review Date: 2008-06-30

It isn’t going to be long now before the Golden Hands Before God are the next big thing in the Canadian music industry.  The more I listen to their debut EP, the more convinced I become in the above statement. 

I knew they had something when I saw their passionately intense yet always melodic live set at the Silver Dollar, and they took that appreciation to a new level with their tambourine-shattering, shirt-removing, sweaty rock set at the Rancho back in November. 

But it wasn’t until about the fourth listen of Here until I realized just how privileged I am to be in a position to get to hear the advance of what could be just a massive release in the Canadian music scene.
 

Because of my position booking the Rancho, I consider myself as having my finger if not on the pulse of the music scene in Toronto, at least fairly close to it.  And lately I have been feeling that there has been a significant push back to authenticity in music.  By that I mean almost a revival of bands full of supremely talented musicians who just write excellent, catchy songs, without a lot of bells and whistles, that appeal to a wider audience.  This runs contrary to the other trend, = massive bands playing instruments I’ve never heard of that from time to time aren’t needed. 

The Golden Hands Before God are proof that you can marry these two trends and do it in a way that is almost impossible to stop listening to.  This is a six-piece band that uses every one of their components to the fullest degree.  Even tambourine player Jamie Greer is prominently featured throughout the EP, and he might be the most compelling player when you catch a GHBG live show. 

On Here, the band captures the intense energy of a GHBG live show while polishing it up just enough not to get nagged for being too garage or too raw.  Lead single “Communist Party” has already made my year-end mixtape, and I haven’t even thought about it yet.  With this single, Golden Hands do what hundreds of bands have tried to do only to end up receiving a ton of flack for trying to sound like another sixties revival band.  It’s a song that would have been beloved in any decade, but right now in 2008 it’s just a kickass rock song that doesn’t try to hide behind anything.  You can listen to it on repeat a dozen times in a row and still not find any chinks in its armour. 

Opening track “One Fine Morning” has a quieter intensity.  The vocals are subdued, pretty and hypnotic -- leading to something but not in a major rush to get there.  It does eventually when the numbers “One… two…. One! Two! Three” hit and the song reaches full force with an awesome lick followed by other guitar wizardry from the band.  The whole song is very psychedelic and a stellar way to open up an EP. 

I wrote the preceding chunk of this review a few weeks back, and I haven’t touched it since.  The combination of seeing and being completely floored by the GHBG set at the Savannah Room for NXNE, and how closely this record has been associated with my life and a lot of drama going on lately, had me put it on the backburner.

In particular “Blood of November” the closing track of the EP has become a very visceral listening experience for me.  When a song has the ability to piece your life in the way this song has done for me and others, that is perhaps the biggest compliment a musician can get.  It’s a song written by someone who knows nothing about you, but it’s done in such a profound way that it can be related to by so many.
 

All that is missing is the chanting of “All Together Now”, which the Golden Hands Before God have developed as their trademark finisher to their sets.  But maybe that’s better kept as a surprise.  Regardless, this is the best piece of music I’ve heard this year.

Score: 9.3

- Dan