Heavy Heavy Low Low

It’s painful to hear the word math used to describe a style of music. And unfortunately, Heavy Heavy Low Low, hailing from San Jose, California, often get pigeonholed into the patently ponderous pseudo-genre mathcore. It’s supposed to mean there’s a lot of technique — meter shifts and such — along with the hardcore tenets of speed and volume. Although industrial has come to mean electronica with a distortion pedal, it’s a much better adjective for these guys. Something akin to their sound might be heard at a strip-mining operation or near a blast furnace.

Upon speaking with guitarist/vocalist Danny Lee Rankin by phone from, in his words, “fucking New Jersey. Or New York … one of the states,” it becomes clear that sleaze has to be a descriptor as well. “Put something in there about smoking weed, drinking beer, and [performing oral sex on a woman],” he suggests. Beyond that, HHLL is also a huge MySpace success story. For reasons the band members can’t explain, the songs on their page average half a million listens each. Danny, who, inexplicably, says he goes by the second name “Cranny,” says the tour is going well: “Better than I expected, it’s been fucking crazy.” He points out this is their most successful tour since the 2006 release of their breakthrough album, Steak, Football, and Tits. ‘Nuff said.