Years of Denial
Love Cuts EP
VEYL
France’s Years of Denial are one of the most prominent acts in that nation’s active darkwave scene, a fact that is quite possibly due to how malleable the duo’s take on the style has been. As the electro-darkwave tide has risen, they’ve cannily found ways to pluck each of the threads that make up the movement and integrate them into their catalogue; they’re a capable at gothy post-punk, frosty minimal synth, and various strains of body music and electro, and have enough identity to sound like themselves regardless of which direction any given number goes in. New EP Love Cuts, their first collection of new material since 2023’s Suicide Disco Vol. 2, serves as something of a roadmap in that regard, a sample of everything they’ve done and some new tricks besides. Bookended by the moody and downcast “Devil in a Dress” and the full-on techno-body cut “AI Lover”, each song stands on its own stylistically; compare how “Hide and Sick” is big, brash and stomping, while “We Are the Party” resurrects millennial electroclash’s disaffected archness. A goodly part of their ability to unify those sounds comes from the drawling charisma of vocalist Barkosina Hanusova, who sells the oppressively depressive synthpop of “Affaire de Coeur” just as easily as she does the simmering, acid touched groove of “In Your Bed”. It all works, a testament to Years Of Denial’s focus and drive.
Olvido
Lo inexorable
self-released
It’s easy for inherently traditionalist forms like deathrock to end up eating their own tail and rehashing the past to no real avail. With their first LP (though at 22 minutes “long” is doing some heavy lifting), Columbian quartet don’t rework the deathrock blueprint by any stretch, but they do find a solid balance of its core elements, and infuse them with a whole lot of rage. Musically the songwriting and delivery of guitar and bass on the record will sound familiar to those schooled on SoCal forefathers like Christian Death and TSOL, albeit revved up to hardcore speed. Tunes like “Fracaso” and “Habítate” dress the guitar up in just enough effect to get the funereal atmosphere across without sacrificing groove or immediacy, and that their take on a cut by influential Spanish goth rockers Parálisis Permanente sounds of a piece with their own material speaks well of Olvido’s study of the genre. But it’s burying the lede to not focus on the presence of vocalist Brandie, who completely shreds her way through each of the eight tracks on offer on Lo inexorable. Absolutely shrieking each and every note on the record while still staying wholly on key and with commanding vocal control, it’s impossible to not have the hair on your neck stand up as the focus of the record invariably shifts to her vocal rage and strength track after track. If this is as violent and impassioned as they are on record, I dread to think of how her vocals would hit at the right live gig.
