Those Darlins - Screws Get Loose - #11

Those Darlins - Screws Get Loose

The second release of this band has made it to my place. Im still waiting for the debut album, but I have a faint idea, that I will have to order the CD. Right now, I've two orders for vinyl pending for the album. I don't have much hope, but let's wait and see. The pressing quality of the LP is excellent. Very quiet between the tracks, almost no background noise. Close to zero, as good as it gets with vinyl. The vinyl itself is absolutely flat, as in flat earth. The whole thing comes with a printed innersleeve (picture of the band plus lyrics) and a poster Plus, in this age of digital media, there's a MP3 download code inside. Both poster and code are a nice additional, but first, I doubt that the poster will go up on many walls and I never understood why bands include MP3 downloads with their vinyl releases (well, I do, but I'm not in this game).

All songs are original tracks by the band or rather by one or two of it's members. A surprise there, the drummer gets quite a few credits with regards to songwriting. The whole set-up of the band seemed to me more like a trio of women with a male drummer as the fifth weel (does that make sense?)! Looks like I shouldn't jump to conclusions based purely on video footage. Anyway, with no covers at all on this recording, the band is a step ahead of the competition (at least in my book). You might want to check out the "Be Your Bro" video. I freely admit it, I'm not the type that x-rays lyrics, but this one certainly caught my attention. I think there's an underlying sadness and anger there, that maybe just a woman can understand and bring to words.

There are catchy melodies throughout the album. Putting a band into a genre is more or less difficult and I don't know how they see themselves, but it certainly is no punk (although I've seen them labelled as such). Punk is another beast (but then, I'm on the European side of the pond). To me, Those Darlins are a pretty good band playing Rock music. There's even some Glam in it (just listen to "$"). I mean, they're not a million miles away from other bands fishing in the same waters, but Those Darlins have an advantage in that their songwriting capabilities are a cut above the rest and I'm pretty impressed by the vocals too. It just sounds fresh, giving Rock music a push that is sometimes coming from unexpected directions. I do hope, Those Darlins are here to stay and make some waves.

Cheers

Devon