On Darker My Love’s second full length album, rightfully named 2, the band amps up their blend of psychedelic Brit rock and delivers a batch of heavily distorted scuzzed out rock gems. The album as a whole delivers a densely layered musical soundscape of feedback drenched guitars and pulsating drums that at some points are reminiscent of My Bloody Valentine’s shoegaze rock and at other times spacey psychedelic Brit Rock. What makes Darker My Love’s sophomore release unique is the progression of the album from pretty straightforward psychedelic rock songs to the last five songs which are epic heavily orchestrated prog rock influenced numbers that build into one another.
The stand out songs include “Two Ways Out,” which bumps up the vocals and turns down the feedback to deliver one of the most accessible pop gems of the album. This is a song that the Dandy Warhols wish they had written and will most definitely be a hit on the radio. “Blue Day” is a perfect blend of psychedlic and shoegaze, equipped with epic spiraling guitars, drums and maracas which envelope the dreamy vocals of the lead singer creating an all encompassing tripped out atmospheric feel of the song. “All the Hurry and Wait” is a grandiose Psychedelic prog rock epic that definitely showcases the musicianship of the band complete with a symphony in the background as well swirling guitars that build and transition in to the next song, “Waves.” Darker My Love has successfully avoided the sophomore slump with this phenomenal album, which shows a band that is crafting a unique sound that is only going to get better over time.
