Death Valley Girls – Darkness Rains

Standing at a crossroads of rock with Death Valley Girls on Darkness Rains, it's not the beastly riot that it should be

Album Review by James Ewen | 02 Oct 2018
Album title: Darkness Rains
Artist: Death Valley Girls
Label: Suicide Squeeze Records
Release date: 5 Oct

Death Valley Girls are a condensed history lesson of rock through the ages, spanning rebellion, nihilism, occult and glamour behind a stone-faced moniker. The band’s third full-length outing Darkness Rains marches onward down their trodden path and it’s a shame that the stance they take at this crossroads of rock isn’t bold enough to establish a demonic bazaar or make significant strides in any given direction.

After two false-start tracks, Darkness Rains finally kicks into gear with b2b cuts Disaster (Is What We’re After) and Unzip Your Forehead, which shows them firmly digging their heels in and smashing their beastly influences together. They strut with sizzling riffs, glorious glam (especially the former’s hand clap bonanza) and Bonnie Bloomgarden’s knife-edged balance of whimpering, yet authoritative vocals. Unfortunately, the aggregate ratio of tunes on offer is in favour of misfires.

They capture an essence of the past but it never feels any more than a bottled attempt at bringing a product to punters who are overly nostalgic. Their sub-genre mish-mashing may also appeal to those who weren’t present during heydays of yore, serving as a crash course to get them up to speed. But like all accelerated academia it fails to capture the nuances that breathe life into a subject. Ultimately, Darkness Rains flirts heavily with evil, but it lacks the resolute conviction to be taken seriously as a serf of Satan.

However, the album’s occasional power to summon dark forces cannot be overlooked. Abre Camino’s buzzing-bee synth, war drums and snake charming harmonies lure you in before morphing into a jangled, razor wire cobweb of menace, seizing tight and cutting deep.

Listen to: Disaster (Is What We’re After), Abre Camino

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