Darker My Love
2

After the discography of Swervedriver, let's come to their heirs, among which the "Darker My Love" have emerged. This is their second work, from 2008 with the unassuming title "2," which comes after their self-titled debut in 2006. The leader, however, is a guy with a very significant last name: Tim Presley. The band is from Los Angeles. The question is, how come the best heirs of shoegaze (a British wave) are in California? The best are all there, see Silversun Pickups, Warlocks, and now also Darker My Love. The answer lies in the reference to the Californians, The Byrds and Grateful Dead, to whom all these groups are indebted to varying degrees. Let's say they reclaimed what belongs more to them than to the British. The best musical ideas often originate in the UK, but US bands are much better at developing them. They have the strength in numbers on their side. These new groups are succinctly described as "nugaze" with a somewhat derogatory tone. But it's a simplification that can mislead. In reality, they are all psychedelic groups that are connected, it's true, in some measure to shoegaze. However, more to the second phase of shoe, that of the '90s and not the first of the '80s of Jesus and Bloody Valentine.

And so we come to Darker My Love. The group is heavily skewed towards psychedelia like the Warlocks and is equally interested in reaching as many people as possible. From the album, I highlight the best tracks. The opening of "Northern Soul" is good but more hard than psychedelic. "Two Ways Out," very beautiful with its typically sixties background choirs. Probably already a 45 rpm. "Blue Day," very shoe. This is a track like "Chapterhouse", a group from the second shoe wave that made a couple of albums between 1991 and 1993. Beautiful. "Pale Sun" is the standout track of the album, the one that should break through on US radio and bring them to people's attention. Beautiful. Listen to it first and you'll want to listen to the whole album. It's not easy to set up tracks like this even if someone will wrinkle their nose as always. "White Composition" a beautiful ballad that seems to come out of a Byrds album. Here the psychedelic references of the late '60s are very strong. The same goes for "Even In Your Lightest Day", here too everything resonates psychedelic, including the distortion of the guitars. Even the sound of these is deliberately sparse and typically '60s. We are deep in it. "Waves" wakes us from the dream. Accelerated rhythm and this time the reference returns to the fusion between shoegaze and psyche, and the heavily distorted guitars betray the band's intentions. Here Presley performs general rehearsals for lengthening and developing the tracks in different phases. He does it by attaching "Waves" to the subsequent "Talking Words", which is another important track of the album. The shoe and psyche fusion here works perfectly. The song has a pressing rhythm but the psychedelic ecstasy given by the use of voice and choirs, and distorted guitars are also rightly present. "Immediate undertaking" closes the album, and here really the Swervedriver cannot but come to mind. Indeed, the track is initially instrumental and then Presley's lament arrives. That's how they used to close albums too. Certainly, we are on another planet, but Darker really give it their all. Well done.

Alex