!!! (Chk Chk Chk) announced they will be releasing their Certified Heavy Kats EP via Warp on July 31. Alongside the announcement, the band dropped the EP’s first track, “Do the Dial Tone,” and an accompanying music video animated by Cheng-Hsu Chung.
“Furrowed brow finger raised everyone’s got something to say/Everybody wants to simply their situation,” Nic Offer sings amid anticipating strings, the track slowly building into funny undertones as Offer’s creeping voice sways around the electronic beat. The animated visuals follow a robotic, mutanoid creature with colored hues of greens and blues. The lyrics follow the track underneath the visuals, the creature walking down an empty street as he quickly passes by buildings. He then begins to break dance and fly around a red room, the band’s logo splattering the walls.
!!! took to Twitter to announce the release of their new song, and explain the inspiration and meaning behind “Do the Dial Tone.” They explained how they reflect on the passage of time, and that things that once seemed so permanent have become obsolete. !!! also described the song as being a celebration to the current access to information everyone has, but that opinions and judgements made by others will eventually become obsolete as well.
“Sometimes it takes awhile to notice something you took for granted your whole life has been made obsolete and is gone,” the band said on Twitter. “Like a dial tone. You’ll probably never hear one again. That’s fine. Technology is there to be made obsolete.
“There’s nothing there to be nostalgic about but as you recognize it’s extinction you think about your own relationship to the present… what you take for granted… what may be gone soon….
“This is a song about being overwhelmed with opinions and recommendations but at the same time being in love with and celebrating the access to information. After all, a !!! tour isn’t a !!! tour until we’re looking on some producer’s wikipedia page… but people also bask in the power of publicly judging everything from restaurants to hospital waiting rooms.
“And these opinions and platforms will go the way of the dial tone soon enough. Did we steal this beat from a KLF cover band that Nic was in? Absolutely, we did. Isn’t that what KLF would do? Absofuckinglutely, they would.”
Certified Heavy Kats will be !!! first release since their 2019 album, Wallop. Blending punk sounds with experimental electronic, the Sacramento band formed in 1995. Certified Heavy Kats will be the band’s seventh EP, the last having been 2018’s MEGAM!!!X VOL 1.
Certified Heavy Kats EP Tracklist
1. “Do the Dial Tone”
2. “Maybe You Can?t Make It”
3. “Tighten the Grip”
4. “Let It Fall”
5. “Wonderful Life”
6. “Take It Easy”
7. “Walk It Off”
Photo credit: Raymond Flotat
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