In the beginning was The Darkness. And The Darkness was good. Then God said, "Let there be rock!"
In 2003, English rockers The Darkness shocked the world with Permission to Land, a ridiculous album that sold a ridiculous 3.5 million copies on the strength of massive power chords and a straight-faced Spinal Tap vibe. Equal parts glam rock and cock rock (with a thimble-full of hair metal, to boot), The Darkness breathed new life into the kind of highly unfashionable music that—until this record surfaced—most people were happy to leave in their distant, burnout pasts.
Justin Hawkin's hair-raising falsetto and his brother Dan's huge guitar riffs are back on the sublimely-named One Way Ticket to Hell...And Back, their highly-anticipated sophomore album. The self-professed "best band in the world" turns in a knockout performance that, lucky for them, makes that claim sound a little less implausible. One Way Ticket is a pitch-perfect parody of a maturing rock band, complete with strings, brass, bagpipes and, yes, even pan flutes. What this album demonstrates is that The Darkness have the highly unusual capacity to succeed simultaneously on two levels: their songs are tremendous and they're damned funny, too.
The record opens with a ponderous pan flute and keyboard melody before the opening chords of "One Way Ticket" kick in, accompanied by—what else?—cowbell! The song is ostensibly an anti-cocaine anthem, but, in true form, the message gets a little mixed along the way. It's one thing to sing "my septum is in tatters and I've still got the runs," but it kind of defeats the purpose to have a reference to "lines of glorious gack" a few bars later. As dumb as an AC/DC song, only on purpose.
"Knockers" is, quite surprisingly, not about what you might think. It is a semi-prurient "love" song, however, that hinges, as many songs on this album do, on desperation and settling for second (or third) best. The anti-profundity of this song is best summed up by the chorus, which is a repetition of "I love what you've done with your hair" sung over a rocking, Stonesy guitar line.
Article comments
1 - -E
I was wondering if The Darkness was gonna stick around or be more of a "One Hit Wonder" band. I hope they stick around as their first album cracks me up (I actually woke up with one of their songs in my head this morning). I'm glad you liked the album, I'll have to give it a listen.
2 - JTEE
Finally....a good review on the CD. I think this album also showed the band's maturity. The sign of a great rock band is that they don't sound exactly the same from album to album. I LOVE THIS CD.
3 - Gary Diamond
No-one knows what it is about the Darkness, but no matter how ludacrous they seem to become, anyone with a sense of humour when it comes to music can still appreciate that they are FUN.
After all, shouldn't good rock music be a light-hearted romp that'll make your feet tap at low volumes and your head bang at higher ones? Especially, you could say, when it's being played by a spandex-attired falsetto-voiced gentleman singing about a woman with "Dinner Lady Arms".
If you think their debut was overblown - and lets face it, subtlety was sorely lacking - you're still going to be surprised at how bombastic this one is. But the excessive approach works quite well, even if it can detract from the overall groove of the basic drums/guitar format at times.
The behind-the-bikeshed lyrical charm is still present, which when coupled with layered vocals that could shatter glass from a hundred feet, makes for some amusing moments: 'You're pushing thirty, well thirty stone', 'Put your arms around me; your dinner lady arms', 'Chewing off my face, talking absolute rubbish' to name a few.
Pretty much every track has good to great hooks, although these are not as naggingly insistant as those on the debut are a few listens you'll know the title of each track and all the best lines.
Above all, this is out of the ordinary. Amidst a backdrop of disco beat rockers with sensible haircuts the Darkness are pretty damn hard to miss, and on the strength of this showing that is a very good thing.
(*)(*)(*)(*)( )
4 - Temple Stark
The section editor chose this as a pick of the week. Go HERE to find out why.
Also, as a part of being a pick you get to make a pick of your own for anytime from Dec. 3 on. Click the same HERE link to find out how.
Thank you.
Temple
5 - ed
best band ever. the new album is amazing
6 - Harver
I wish they hadent split up