Indie legends The Format have returned in radiant form after nearly two decades with “Holy Roller,” a fiery reckoning that turns chaos into clarity and heartbreak into rebirth – and the exhilarating first glimpse of their upcoming third album, ‘Boycott Heaven.’ Both blistering and vulnerable, it’s a quintessential The Format anthem: Witty, wounded, and wonderfully alive – a long-awaited roar from two old friends ready to write the next chapter of their story.
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Stream: “Holy Roller” – The Format
“I’d fake my death if it weren’t such a mess for the people I love…”
Nate Ruess opens “Holy Roller” with a line that could only come from someone who’s lived through the fire and come out scorched but smiling. It’s been nineteen years since The Format’s sophomore (and, until earlier today, final) album Dog Problems, yet their first new single in nearly two decades doesn’t just pick up where they left off – it erupts, drenched in self-awareness, spirit, and that trademark blend of wit and wound that once made them the most beloved band to ever quietly implode.
Even though 2006’s Dog Problems became their last studio album, its final track “If Work Permits” never felt like a final bow so much as a cathartic question mark – a sailor cautious about anchoring, a heart trying to bridge distance, an “I’m doing fine” whispered between the cracks. Lines like “I could use a warm kiss instead of a cold goodbye” and “if she seems as lonely as me, let her sink” carry the weight of both letting go and hoping someone cares enough not to. Fast-forward two decades, and “Holy Roller” feels like the same voice – rawer, wiser, and bolder – stepping back into the conversation, refusing silence, demanding a response, ready to burn and bleed and hope again.
I’d fake my death
If it weren’t such a mess
For the people I love
Or assume won’t forget me
But I’m staying alive
Just to see you roll your eyes
And sigh
Released October 6 via The Format’s own label The Vanity Label, “Holy Roller” is a fun, fiery indie rock anthem filled with red-hot passion and angst, charisma and churn. It’s peak The Format: Self-critical and raw, achingly exposed and unfiltered, emotionally charged and vulnerable all at once. Ruess sounds as galvanizing and glorious as ever – his voice still that rare lightning-in-a-throat combination of theater, tenderness, and thrill – while Sam Means’ glistening guitars crash and shimmer beneath him, joined by producer Brendan O’Brien (Pearl Jam, Bruce Springsteen, The Killers) on bass and Matt Chamberlain (David Bowie, Bob Dylan, Fiona Apple) on drums.
“Holy Roller” begins not with a bang, but with a conversation – or maybe a confession.
For the first time in years, it’s just Nate Ruess and Sam Means again: Ruess’s radiant voice cracks open the silence as his thoughts bounce off Sam’s guitar, the two old friends falling into a familiar rhythm that feels both fragile and eternal. The intimacy of that opening moment feels almost cinematic; you can hear the history between them – the weight of distance, the comfort of their kinship, the quiet astonishment – and satisfaction – of being here again.
“I’d fake my death if it weren’t such a mess for the people I love,” Ruess sings, his words landing like both a joke and a truth – a wry smile masking existential exhaustion. It’s classic The Format: Playful and self-deprecating on the surface, devastating underneath. The line distills the tension that’s always lived inside their music – the push and pull between wanting to disappear and wanting to be seen, between irony and sincerity. In that single verse, they reestablish their chemistry and their contradictions. It’s a reminder that even at their most theatrical, The Format’s power has always come from the human ache beneath the melody.
As the verse unfolds, Ruess leans further into that mix of self-loathing and self-awareness that’s always made The Format so magnetic. “But I’m staying alive just to see you roll your eyes and sigh,” he admits – half-taunt, half-confession – skewering himself even as he longs for connection. There’s humor in it, but also heartbreak; the quiet understanding that love and frustration often live side by side. “If you got nothing to prove, then tell me why would you do this?” he asks, the line flickering like an argument turned inward. Every phrase feels deliberate, every breath a balancing act between cynicism and sincerity. It’s messy, vulnerable, human – the kind of emotional honesty that made us fall in love with them in the first place.
The chorus is pure catharsis, a cry into the cosmos:
Holy Roller
Don’t go wasting all your time
Praying for a sign
I’m burning out faster
than a candle in the night
I’ll be gone before sunrise
It’s a spirited roar into the ether – a plea, a warning, and a liberation all at once. Every breath Ruess takes, each snare hit and every melodic rise feels like shaking hands with the ghosts of your twenties and realizing you’re still breathing, still burning, still you.
If the first verse and chorus feel like a secret whispered across a room, the second verse is where the walls start shaking.
Ruess’s questions grow sharper, more pointed: “Tell me again how you lost all your friends / Tell me when did it start / And when will it end.” It’s as if the song is widening its lens from self-reckoning to a shared indictment – a hard look at the other person and maybe, by extension, at himself. That sardonic edge, always lurking in The Format’s writing, flashes into view here: “But don’t bother fixing your hair if you’ve got nothing to wear.” It’s a quip, a gut-punch, and another perfect example of the band’s knack for wedding humor to heartbreak.
Tell me again how you lost all your friends
Tell me when did it start
And when will it end
Cause I see no wrong if you were to tag along
But don’t bother fixing your hair
If you’ve got nothing to wear
Musically, this is the point where “Holy Roller” stops simmering and starts to boil. Means’s guitar chords hit harder, O’Brien’s bass digs in, and Chamberlain’s drums kick up like thunder – the song swelling from a tense back-and-forth into a full-band conflagration. By the time The Format hit the second chorus, Ruess’s once-intimate plea has become a stadium-sized howl. You can hear the depth of their cinematic sound blooming in real time, every instrument carving space for his voice to climb higher, brighter, and bolder. It’s The Format fully awake and fully alive, their youthful fire now tempered with experience – and it’s thrilling to witness.
And then comes the breakdown – the kind of lyrical gut-punch that reminds you why The Format were beloved by all who came across them – a band defined by the tension and tenderness between its two creative cores.
There is a debt that
I never thought applied to me
Until I got to your bed
And now I’m atop all of the sheets
Crawling on my knees
Choking on the air that you breathe
It’s a breathtaking moment – intimate, erotic, and almost suffocating in its vulnerability. Ruess’s voice trembles and climbs while Means’s guitar burns slow beneath him, the two locked in perfect push-and-pull as the rhythm section surges like a heartbeat on overdrive. Together, they transform self-flagellation into something transcendent.
This is where “Holy Roller” truly soars: The band’s chemistry catching fire, their restraint giving way to release.
It’s the sound of everything that made The Format unforgettable – the drama, the humor, the ache, the unflinching humanity – roaring back to life in one breathtaking, blistering moment.
But it doesn’t end there. The song plunges deeper, trading reflection for confrontation as Ruess spits out a fever dream of images:
Come on Holy Roller
Let me out the corner
Make me think that I’m in control
I thought you was a kitten
‘Til you started hissing
Scratching at me like I’m a post
It’s hot-blooded and breathless – The Format at their most unguarded. You can feel the sweat in this section: the pulse of Means’s overdriven guitar rising and falling against Ruess’s voice like two lungs sharing the same breath. His words twist between desire and damnation – lovers and sinners tangled in the same bed – until it’s hard to tell whether he’s pleading for release or punishment.
If I let your daughter
Push me underwater
Can I fall asleep with the ghost?
If I let your daughter
Turn me to a martyr
Is Jesus gonna save my soul?
As the song descends into its final verse, that intimacy turns combustible. “If I let your daughter push me underwater / Can I fall asleep with the ghost? / If I let your daughter turn me to a martyr / Is Jesus gonna save my soul?” It’s delirious, dark, and strangely holy – a wild mix of lust, guilt, and redemption. Ruess and Means move in exact lockstep, their instruments simmering on the edge of a new dawn, as if trying to purge something that’s been festering since 2006. This is the Format’s brilliance at full heat: That fearless willingness to sit inside the chaos, to let it sweat, sting, and shimmer until it finally cracks open into light.
Holy Roller
Don’t go wasting all your time
Praying for a sign
I’m burning out faster
than a candle in the night
I’ll be gone before sunrise
It’s visceral, seductive, suffocating – a reckoning wrapped in desire and doubt. Where Dog Problems faded out in weary ambiguity – a parting shot disguised as acceptance (“Yeah I’m doing just fine / And if she seems as lonely as me, let her sink…”) – “Holy Roller” feels like that same sailor washed ashore, eyes open and heart still pounding, ready to fight the tide again.
The Format have returned, and with them comes the spark, substance, and sincerity that made their music feel like a lifeline from day one.
It’s more than a comeback; it’s a rekindling of something wild, wounded, and wonderfully alive. Means and Ruess have reemerged, returning to the spotlight together with the same restless hearts and razor-sharp wit that once redefined “indie” music all those years ago.
And there’s so much for fans new and old to get excited about: After fun.’s meteoric rise and critical acclaim and Means’ and Ruess’ respective solo adventures, Boycott Heaven – The Format’s newly announced third album, out January 23, 2026 via The Vanity Label – promises a resurrection of The Format’s restless spirit.
The timing of The Format’s announcement couldn’t be more powerful or poetic. It arrives on the heels of a triumphant three-show run that reignited their flame in real time: a sold-out homecoming performance at Phoenix’s Veterans Memorial Coliseum – their first show in years – followed by two euphoric nights at New York City’s legendary Beacon Theatre, with one final stop set for Los Angeles’ Hollywood Forever Cemetery on October 10. After nearly two decades of absence, the band have returned to rooms full of people who never stopped singing their songs – and now, with Boycott Heaven officially on the horizon, that momentum has become something seismic.
At their first night in New York, the electricity inside the Beacon Theatre was palpable – the room alive with anticipation for a band no one thought they’d ever hear live again. The crowd erupted the moment the lights dimmed, voices rising in unison as the band opened quite fittingly with “Matches” into “I’m Actual.” And we all took the next hour to talk about them. Every song felt like a shared memory brought to life – “Wait, Wait, Wait” exploded with joy, “Pick Me Up” rang out with rousing resilience, “Dog Problems” swept through the theatre like a collective, dramatic exhale. And when “The First Single (You Know Me)” hit, the air turned raw and self-aware, every lyric a reminder of why this band still means so much to so many.
They played all the fan favorites, including future favorite “Holy Roller,” which silenced the crowd in an instant. It was one of those rare moments when the energy in the room shifted from celebration to reverence: Thousands standing still, listening, before erupting in applause as the final chorus crashed down. You could feel it in your chest – that unmistakable spark that only The Format can summon, the sound of something lost being found again. The band sounded as tight and dynamic as ever, every note crackling with intention and joy, and Ruess sang with astonishing precision and awe-inspiring power – his singular, stunning, instantly-recognizable voice soaring, unweathered by time, every word carrying the weight of years and the thrill of renewal.
The Format were always masters of existential pop, marrying grandeur with grit; on their “new” first single, they sound older, wiser, but no less daring.
We know them – or we think we do…
“Holy Roller” isn’t nostalgia – it’s renewal. It’s proof that the band who once sang about letting her sink never truly did. They just went deep, held their breath, and came up roaring.
For all the time that’s passed, The Format don’t sound like a band chasing ghosts, dwelling on their own history, or fixating on a legacy. Sure, they’re picking up right where they left off, but that’s not what “Holy Roller” is about. There’s no grand statement here, no desperate grasp at glory – just two old friends making something beautiful again and letting the music speak for itself.
Stay tuned for more restless, radiant, and relentlessly human songs to come with Boycott Heaven – if “Holy Roller” is any indication, The Format’s long-awaited third album will find them doing what they’ve always done best: Questioning everything sacred, dancing with their demons, and finding light in the wreckage – mapping a course through our collective angst and ennui.
For now, get lost in the infectious fervor and frenzy of “Holy Roller,” available wherever you stream music. After all these years, it’s enough just to hear The Format again – refreshed and revitalized, alive in the noise, and still finding new ways to make uncertainty feel like salvation.
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Stream: “Holy Roller” – The Format
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© Carlo Cavaluzzi
© Carlo Cavaluzzi
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