DEAD LIGHTS
LASH
darkTunes Music Group
Dead Lights have walked a very fine line since debuting back in 2020; the trans-European duo of Richard Van Kruysdijk and Saul Stranger (of the Netherlands and the UK respectively) have a firm handle on strong synthpop songwriting, with a healthy dollop of glammy attitude in their performances and visual presentation. On the other hand, they’ve also zeroed in on broader industrial and body music sounds and production, which has given their material plenty of club appeal. Serving up both the hooks and the beats would seem like the perfect formula, especially where their presentation has been so distinctive thus far, but they’ve never totally clicked on record, coming up a bit short in execution versus their obvious ambitions.
With that in mind, their new album LASH is a step closer to being completely dialled in. The broad premise as outlined in the Bandcamp liners is a celebration of low art and destruction, certainly a fertile ground for a band with their leanings and sardonic outlook, and a good match for the grittier elements of their sound. The band have always been reliable for a club banger, and the record certainly has some candidates for that purpose; “The Human Touch” weds Priest-esque synthpop to a nice thick bassline and some cleverly arranged and pointedly catty vocals that jump up around the stereo spectrum. “Gravity” latches onto those thick EDM basslines that descended to Our Thing via the auspices of Gessafelstein and positions them around growled and hissed vocals, the melody carried by the little snatches of programming the occasional burst of carefully layered singing. Those tracks really highlight one of the album’s great strengths, namely the care with which every element is positioned in the arrangement, especially the vocals, which vary wildly in terms of performance and processing, and give the band a really identifiable sound.
Interestingly, the band’s best moments here are those that defy standard club appeal; a cut like “Resonate” could certainly make its way to the dancefloor, but the awkward gait of its drums and oddball change-ups between sections are so unusual that the grander shape of the song is never totally obvious. That’s not a bad thing at all, in fact it intrigues specifically because it’s never really clear where you are within the song, until it cleverly circles or shortcuts its way back to the refrain unexpectedly. Alternately, the way that “The Dream Membrane” slowly accelerates from its ambient beginnings to its heavy industrial groove is fun, the restraint of the songcraft and production in direct opposition to the band’s over the top aesthetics.
With that in mind, the band still falls prey to that excess in spots. “(The Edge of) Dusk” is fine number from a songwriting perspective, but is played more straight than most of the record and for far too long, more than its hook can sustain with or without its piano-led outro. And where “The Algorithim”‘s accelerated pace and machinegun programming has some appeal, the repeated ‘rhythm’ and ‘algorithm’ wordplay is already as stale as the pseudo EDM drops in sprinkles into things. It’s commendable that Dead Lights aren’t just delivering fit for streaming two minute sprints to the chorus on LASH, and to their credit they succeed plenty in their more ambitious efforts, such as the orchestrally-minded outro track “Unmaker”, truly a case of all their best elements coming together to good effect. With a bit more consistency, and a tighter handle on their big ideas, LASH takes DEAD LIGHTS further towards the grand payoff they’ve been promising in their records up til this point.
