"Hold Up" was always an obvious single contender from swaggering Dublin honchos REPUBLIC OF LOOSE'S debut album "This Is The Tomb Of The Juice", so it's no surprise to find it doing the lippy, lairy business when unleashed on its' lonesome.
"Hold Up" proffers an insistent, skinny funk handshake, very remniscent of the George Clinton-era Chili Peppers of "Freaky Styley", though Mik Pyro's inspired nonsense such as "We need more time time, to drink up all that wine, wine" also echoes the bizarre brilliance Shaun Ryder spewed up on Happy Mondays' day-glo masterpiece "Bummed" and the fine, off-the-wrist (oo-er!) guitar solo finds Paul Kossoff's ghost hovering in the studio.
Chill out, apparently, is the message, though when Mik threatens to "drop a Vicodin and pick you 'up round three", you kinda get the feeling hanging out in a flotation tank ain't exactly what he's got in mind.
For those of you missing the expletive count of the album versh, it's also included as a B-side, along with a looped-out new track called "Rugged", which starts out a capella, with the lads going: "Shum shum shum...aaah" before slipping into something rather more comfortable via a diseased gospel-funk backdrop and Mik aping early Nick Cave and vowing to "put 16 holes in your door". Whoo. And he rhymes "pariah" with "Black Maria" too, the cheeky get. Talk about taking liberties.
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But that's the deal with Republic Of Loose. Anything glittering will be snatched by these fucked-up, magpie-style banditos and remodelled fo their own ends. And the rest of us can damn well shag the consequences. Get up, get out and get Loose seems the only course of action.
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