Matty Rue - Vox, Slide Guitar
Nick Ott - Drums, Organ, Piano
Alli Pheteplace - Guitar, Drums
Panther MacDonald - Bass
PRESS:
"The Holy Kiss revs up the wall of sound while lead singer Matty Rue screams his guts out and throws the microphone cord around. Just when he's about to crack open, the band drops into a melodic part of the song and Rue shows his true talent - singing from the bottom of his soul."
- Tony Dushane, San Francisco Chronicle
"San Francisco trio the Holy Kiss makes a dark and sweetly discordant murder-ballad-inspired racket that's perfect for conjuring the limbo-treading spirits of the cheats, crazies, drunks and other societal castaways the band likes to sing about in its shadowy, Dickensian ditties."
- Bill Picture, San Francisco Chronicle
"The Holy Kiss's Matty Rue Morgue channels the grit and grace of Tom Waits through the body of a modern-day Lestat."
- John Lombardo, San Francisco Bay Guardian
"Considering their funereal garb and dark preoccupations, THE HOLY KISS seem to have a lightness of spirit - and devil-may-sorta-care sense of humor - that belies their collective age of 87 (they're all between 25 and 35) and some fearsome, cacophonous blues-rock performances, shows that draw Nick Cave and Crime and the City Solution comparisons and have turned clubs like Rickshaw Stop into slightly spooked, rocked-out sock hops.
(Matty Rue Morgue) The Holy Kiss vocalist has written most of the band's songs, filtering ealy blues through 'crystals or whatever', he drawls. 'Just to fuck with it a little bit.'
The Holy Kiss see dark romance in city sleaze. Bay area threesome The Holy Kiss mix up a musical potion of young (fleeting) love, old blues, goth drama, and dark thoughts."
- Kimberly Chun, San Francisco Bay Guardian
"The Holy Kiss took the stage at around 12 (the witching hour appropriately) and preceded to reinvent the genre with their epilleptic blues. Lead singer Matty Rue throws himself all over the stage like a tall black scarecrow, howling the refrain “sooo sick and tired of crying!” California, you’re alright."
- Lauren Everett, L.A. Record
"Bay Areans the Holy Kiss began on a dissonant indie note and transformed slowly into the bastard child of the Birthday Party and Black Heart Procession. No complaints: While front man Matty Rue Morgue (possibly not his real name) lacks Nick Cave's icy moan, he possesses a similar lyrical knack - a simple line like 'And if I had my way/I'd have my way with her,' juxtaposed against the group's aggressive sound, came off as a poignant moment amid chaos. Another Holy Kiss highlight was drummer Nick Ott (probably his real name), looming like a giant over an elfin drum kit while assaulting the skins feverishly enough to risk spontaneous combustion."
- Tatiana Simonian, L.A. Weekly
"San Francisco’s The Holy Kiss are led by Leucadian singer/writer Matty Rue Morgue, who as a teenager observed through binoculars the coroner vans leaving Heaven’s Gate, and who now as a young man (in severe clothing) leading a band (also respectfully severe) finds continued and sophisticated inspiration in that same distance between life and death.
His band The Holy Kiss (with Nick Ott, Alli Pheteplace and Panther McDonald) makes the kind of murder blues and murder ballads that Nick Cave, Tav Falco and Harry Smith all put powerfully to vinyl, lifting lyrics from the Son of Sam for the first track on a coming album of songs about devilish doings in the middle of the night.
Covers of Erik Satie and Nina Simone (and stated obsessions with Bessie Smith and Skip James, whose woman was so famously got by the devil in 1931) speak (from beyond the grave, of course) to The Holy Kiss’s tense philosophical balance between swamp-gothic-ism and continental despair and to The Holy Kiss’s also-tense Bad Seed slash-blues sound."
- Chris Ziegler, The District Weekly
"The Holy Kiss not only creates fantastic music, but they have an amazing aesthetic appeal. Much like Bowie's Ziggy Stardust and other reincarnations, The Holy Kiss' image draws you into their world. Their dark theatrical look gives off the allure of danger and mystery, which is beyond intriguing. You know what I mean; it's the same reason why girls always go for the "bad boy."
This is in no way a case of style over substance. The Holy Kiss has the whole package. While they stay close to a gothic theme, they have great musical depth and variation, ranging from bluesy rock riffs to cabaret inspired, piano fueled ballads. As you listen you will be transported into a sinister realm from which there very well may be no way back..."
- Voted one of San Francisco's best by Deli Magazine
"The Holy Kiss is a punkrock band from California, with a fair amount of gothic drama in their sound. Slow rhythms, dramatic vocals from Matty Rue Morgue and sudden harsh outbursts of tensioned melancholic emotion, combined with dark-edged slide-guitar licks, are the core of their quite chaotic drenched in blues indierock sound.
Add some cabaretesque influences to the style of singing and lyrics about young loves and you?ll easily imagine Bela Lugosi with a glass of absinth at the bar together with Tom Waits, while Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds stumble in with a bottle of whiskey and they all decide to make the soundtrack to the next David Lynch movie.
The sound of The Holy Kiss is not that heavy but somewhat comparable to that of The Horrors, be it with a whole lot more musical depth and variation."
- TekNoir of Gothtronic.com
"It's hard not to notice a band with a name like the Holy Kiss - the moniker is taken from scripture that describes greetings between snake-handling priests. Appropriately, the band dishes out gothic punk sermons, and blues-amped rock... Frontman Matty Rue Morgue yowls in a good imitation of Nick Cave's despondence, which contrasts with the group's theatrical high-octane bash. They're loud, chaotic, and rarely anything less than spectacular on stage."
- (NVB) of Flavorpill SF
"The Holy Kiss take the Oscar here, for a performance that combined the honesty and rawness of the blues with the complexity and restraint of indie rock."
- West Coast Performer Magazine
The Holy Kiss are a band I always, always, always want to see live because I love every show I see. But they have a penchant for playing shows when I'm out of town or otherwise unavailable.
Quite selfish of them, if you think of it... Not taking my needs into consideration.
But I digress.....
So I was beyond ecstatic to find out that The Holy Kiss were playing a few doors down from where I was already going to be last Friday night while out and about in Oakland. And, of course, I was not let down.
I love the Nick Cave-esque dark ass brand of rock The Holy Kiss bring. I don't really know how to describe their music other than it'd be a perfect soundtrack for any David Lynch movie or weekend spent in an opium den. Considering the level of drunk I was at this show, the right words to describe it escape me. But you should believe me when I say their live show is great.
Their lead singer wails and croons while pacing the stage and through the crowd like a man on a sonic mission. The rhythm sections keeps it steady with that laid back, "Yeah, we know we got it goin' on" kind of cool, and Alli puts to shame the majority of us who claim we play guitar. I was hypnotized by the cool and by the feel brought on by The Holy Kiss. Their name is not false advertising.
You really need to check this band out. Really.
[Jen Chochinov] WIRETAP MUSIC
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