HEAD LIKE A HOLE — Blood on the Honky Tonk Floor Head Like A Hole 1991 - 2000 (review)

HEAD LIKE A HOLE — Blood on the Honky Tonk Floor Head Like A Hole 1991 - 2000 album cover

Boxset / Compilation · 2000 · Alternative Metal

4/5 · 2015-12-07
Vim Fuego

How the hell do you sum up the career of a band whose sound encompasses death metal and disco, and hits a number of different genres in between? ‘Blood On The Honky Tonk Floor’ has a go at making sense of Head Like A Hole’s musical mix, combining a greatest hits disc with a collection of covers. This was originally intended as the band's epitaph after an acrimonious split in 2000, but the band re-formed in 2008.

Head Like A Hole, or HLAH, depending on when exactly you first heard of them, were one of New Zealand’s most prolific bands of the 1990s, releasing a number of well received albums as well as screeds of EPs and singles

As far as trying to pin down Head Like A Hole’s sound, you may as well try to nail jelly to the wall. Eclectic doesn’t come near it. Sure, it’s mostly still within the rock sphere, but it could range from thrash metal to space rock to psychedelic punk. The band owe a huge debt to the New Zealand alternative music scene of the 1980s and early 1990s, their music created with the old DIY ethos in place, and a low fidelity warmth. The basic mix also throws in a trumpet, a range of vocal effects, some good old-fashioned organ and a warped sense of humour.

When Head Like A Hole first got together, they couldn’t really play, so resorted to theatrics and cheap gimmicks to distract from their lack of musical ability. They gained much notoriety for performing naked, rolling unclothed in a mudflat for a photo shoot, playing death metal versions of Sesame Street songs, and an obsession with kinky sex. However, the band’s sense of humour and originality of approach saw them gain widespread acceptance in the generally conservative New Zealand mainstream music scene.

The band’s two biggest hits open the discs. First track “A Crying Shame” is probably about as sensible as the band ever gets. It is driven by a catchy trumpet riff and carries an almost funky bassline. It is an infectious little tune, and gained the band huge notice, if not chart success. The second disc starts with the world famous in New Zealand cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m On Fire”, an oddity which needs to be heard to be believed. The Boss’ dreary little song is treated with due reverence and care to begin with, but on the second time through, it gets hit with a swirling organ and frantic punk accompaniment. It became a second A-side for the “A Crying Shame” single, and still receives regular radio airplay. Think this sounds like a pop group or a sell out? OK, well just remember that drummer Hidee Beast went on to form black metal cum power metal outfit Demoniac, and the unfortunate person bleeding profusely from his nose on the album cover is wearing a Bolt Thrower t-shirt.

The rest of the greatest hits side of the album crosses into the realms of the bizarre. Not many bands would get away with a song called “Comfortably Shagged”. Head Like A Hole do. “Maharajah” and “Cornbag” explore the realms of country rock, while “Hot Sexy Lusty” is a pornographic dance track. “Hootenanny”, which was also released as a single, is a lazy rock song with thrash interludes. “Wet Rubber” is pure sleazy kink, while “Spanish Goat Dancer” is neither Spanish nor dance music.

“Fish Across Face” was the band’s first single, and as one of the oldest tracks here is also one of the straightest. It is still peculiar in it’s own way, falling somewhere between thrash and a tribal groove, with lyrics like a child’s nursery rhyme.

On the second disc, “Beatnik” sees The Clean’s iconic Kiwi Punk anthem played fairly straight, except a trumpet takes up one of the main guitar melody lines, and the original didn’t mellow out quite the same. “Summer Nights” from the Grease soundtrack was originally a song for lovestruck teens, but now sounds like a rugby player and a drag queen serenading one another. Instead of a traditional lead break, there’s a brief steel guitar interlude. Just to mess things up a bit more, Iron Maiden’s “Wrathchild” keeps Steve Harris’ distinctive bassline and covers it with a wild, squealing synthesiser, and Booga sounds like he’s singing with tampons stuffed up his nose.

“I’m So Excited” has been rocked up in all irony simply because it’s a disco classic. “7 Stripes Of The Mau Mau” sounds like a reject from an MTV unplugged album of songs for the terminally depressed. Gloria Jones’s much covered “Tainted Love” sounds like a bunch of new romantics on an acid dropping 50s beatnik trip.

The band was done the great disservice of being called Faith No More wannabes early in their career. Head Like A Hole were far less conventional. By doing what they wanted to do with no concession to commercial or scene appeal, Head Like A Hole made the scene and the mainstream come to them.