Holy Dose, the experimental electronic hardcore trio out of Los Angeles, released their debut album Don’t Give Everything via Rose Garden earlier this year.
It’s an erratic and gripping trip through religious disillusionment, childhood trauma, bodily instinct, and defiance—twelve tracks, each paired with its own clay idol, and a sound that refuses to sit still.
The band calls the opener Hell “a play on Belinda Carlisle’s song Heaven Is a Place on Earth,” twisting the line into “they say Hell is a place on earth.” The track anchors the record’s central question: what beliefs do we inherit, what do we resist, and what do we carry forward?
This idea of inherited frameworks recurs in Light, which looks back through bloodlines, especially the Norse berserkers who invaded Ireland. “In different times in history, we’d be implored to be someone very different than we are today,” the band notes. It’s a track that blurs personal identity with ancestral myth, tracing how violence and culture embed themselves in the body.
Songs like Price and Ruin dig into physical defense and the psychological aftermath. Price captures the instant when someone turns to harm out of self-protection: “how instinctual reaction will kick in even when you’re a pacifist, and how that reflex will change your view of yourself.” Ruin picks up the thread and asks: if you harm to survive, do you still deserve to be loved?
That question of deserving—of love, of forgiveness, of understanding—spins throughout the album.
Remorse focuses on a lover who forgets the pain they caused. Sorry drags repressed desire out from under layers of religious indoctrination. Fist and Mama draw the parental line: from re-evaluating a father’s failures to begging for salvation in a mother’s presence during a religious breakdown.
Fist, in particular, touches a nerve: “to be a child and to reach a moment in life where you start overcoming trauma… then the question arises of ability: is someone’s best enough?”
The record doesn’t stick to one vocal or instrumental tone. One minute you’re inside a dreamlike chorus, the next it’s raw noise breakdowns and warped punk phrasing. “You fire up the next track and wonder—will this be that 80s-vocal echo again? Some dirty Primus-style riff-bass madness? Bratty noise punk? Or something tipping into full-on art rock?” It’s a collage that would sit comfortably on a tour lineup with Show Me The Body or Drug Church, but Holy Dose throw even more into the pot.
Fade is a meditation on duality: “two lovers and the pain they cause each other,” then “the predestination of holy creatures and the daily routines of humans,” then “the duality of the living and the dead.” The chorus is about desire and envy—being inside wanting out, and outside wanting in.
They don’t hide from the religious psychosis running under it all. Judge digs deepest, mirroring the cadence of Old Testament scripture in its list-heavy structure. The narrator is “a true believer,” not in peace, but in wrath and ritual.
The final two tracks, Magik and Prayer, turn this internal journey outward. Magik ties personal identity to the legacy of Aleister Crowley, confronting “the failures of religion, the truth of a caretaker’s personhood, and pride in one’s own choices.” And Prayer recounts the first psychedelic trip—a 25-mile bike ride through Massachusetts—where the band’s core philosophy crystallized: “don’t give everything to a society that will take everything.”
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Each song has its own visual counterpart, a handmade clay idol. “The center idol is for Prayer,” they explain. Over half the songs have accompanying music videos as well.
Holy Dose will DJ the Lonely Pirate Committee release show on May 9th in LA and perform with The Sophs at Permanent Records on May 30th.
They recommend acts like Deloyde elze, force model, Jacob Cummings, Gylt, Entry, MilkBlood, Ill Peach, Italy 3000 —and frequent gigs at Make Out Music.
Full track-by-track commentary below.
Hell
The story of the record starts with a play on Belinda Carlisle’s song Heaven is a place on earth, staying “they say Hell is a place on earth” this song is about when you are a child and the opinions and views of adults around you are given to you and what you choose to rebel and what you choose to reinforce.
Price
This song is about a the moment someone is willing to do harm to you, and how instinctual reaction will kick in even when you’re a pacifist, and how that reflex will change your view of yourself.
Fade
Fade is about dualities, the first verse is about to lovers, and the pain they cause eachother. The second is about the predestination of holy creatures and the daily routines of humans and the final is the duality of the living and the dead. The chorus, is a meditation on dualistic desire, everyone wanting what someone else has. For the people on the inside they wish they weren’t trapped and could be outside, and the ones on they outside want the safety and comfort of the inside.
Sorry
Sorry is about physical desire, giving into feelings you’ve held at bay during moments of religious indoctrination.
Fist
This is a reflection on fatherhood, to be a child and to reach a moment in life where you start overcoming trauma and you learn to appreciate sacrifice instead of focusing on failures. Then the question arises of ability, is someone’s best enough? Even when they were supposed to be a caretaker, when do you see them as a human.
Light
Light is a look into lineage, specifically how in different times in history we’d be implored to be someone very different than we are today. This song focuses on the berserkers of the Norse invasion of Ireland.
Mama
Mama turns back to the ideas of fist, but in moments of religious psychosis when the only one who might be able to cure you is your mother. Then the chorus is about the selfish desire to die before your loved ones.
Remorse
This is about when a lover forgets the pain they’ve caused you, and when is the balance of pain and love even. What does time heal and when should things be let go.
Ruin
Ruin is about the aftermath of price, when you’re willing to harm someone, and the illness that instills on someone. If your willing to harm someone out of self defense, do you deserve to be loved.
Judge
This song is the deepest religious psychosis of the album, the long listing verses is set to resemble the long lists of the Old Testament. The narrator of this song is a true believer.
Magik
This song is about my shared name with Aleister Crowley and finally the song states things that have only been contemplated in previous songs. The failures of religion, the truth of a caretakers personhood, and pride in one’s own choices to live the life they want to.
Prayer
This song is the final but takes place as an “alpha and omega” story. It is the story of the first psychedelic experience I’ve ever had, where I found my self on a 25 mile bike ride deep into the woods of western Massachusetts and what I came understand that day. The song leads to the end statement and the album of the title, don’t give everything. Don’t give everything to a society that will take everything.
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