Hercules and Love Affair
The Feast of the Broken Heart
Reviewed by: Ari Roth
Although Hercules and Love Affair had their big marquee moment in 2008 with their self-titled debut (and the Antony Hegarty-assisted smash single “Blind”), in many ways they are both a predecessor and antidote to the current-day, somewhat flat and uninspired house revival. While they did studiously recreate classic late New York disco and early Chicago house, they did so with a passion and emotional intensity that many current-day house producers lack. Rooting their sound and attitude firmly in the gay and transgender African American and Latino culture of the 1980s that first birthed these styles, their approach was both historically faithful and deeply alive, brimming with both joyful physicality and simmering melancholy.
2011’s followup, Blue Songs, was overly-long, inconsistent and underwhelming as an album-length statement, but their new album, The Feast of the Broken Heart, spectacularly reestablishes the project at a moment when they have arguably never been more relevant. Trimming down Blue Songs‘ excess to a lean collection of just 10 tracks, The Feast of the Broken Heart finds Hercules and Love Affair at their most focused, vibrant and impactful. In contrast to the previous album’s subdued attitude, Hercules and Love Affair leader Andy Butler describes the new material as featuring “nasty basslines, stormy, bleary-eyed sounds, fiery, rough, tough and ragged old school house productions,” and this shift in approach pays off brilliantly. The drum machines are gritty, raw and visceral, the vocals powerful and full of pain and heartache. The album’s lonely, desperate, end-of-the-night atmosphere conjures the experience of dancing not to escape sorrow, but to fully embrace and embody it, riding it out into catharsis. This is the root of classic house, a quality that Butler intimately understands.
To be sure, the album makes its influences plain and clear – check out the distorted vogue/ballroom commands that periodically emerge on “My Offence,” or the acid squelches of “5:43 To Freedom” – but rather than a lifeless, nostalgic retread, these songs are powerful enough to stand with the very best of the originals. While the majority of the songs begin with verses and nods to conventional song form, each reaches its peak when it zeroes in on a single line, a single hypnotic groove, and rides it out into infinity. While many dance albums are merely a few well-received club singles padded out with more and more filler as the album progresses, The Feast of the Broken Heart actually gets better as it goes on, moving deeper into the tempestuous heart of the dancefloor and culminating in its last third with tracks like first single “Do You Feel the Same?” and the darkly minor key “The Light” and “Liberty.” The Feast of the Broken Heart concludes with “The Key”, a windswept, melancholy ballad with an almost breakbeat-like drum pattern, offering just the faintest glow of light as the night comes to a close and the sun begins to rise over a heartbroken city.
This is not background music. This is not disposable music. This is not music for daytime on the street, when we all have to maintain our composure in plain view. This is music for dark nights in sweaty clubs, for masses of bodies moving together and exorcising the suffering of life on the margins of society. Turn off the lights, turn off your phone, shut the door, and dance.
Rating: Iconic
