Album Reviews
If only every song here was as bruising, focused and funny. One Way Ticket to Hell . . . and Back is a classic case of a hot band with a hit debut -- 2003's Permission to Land -- running headlong into the sophomore jinx. Early sessions for this record were tense; Hawkins, his brother, guitarist Dan Hawkins, drummer Ed Graham and bassist Frankie Poullain broke up at one point. Justin also underwent therapy for a time. Then Poullain was canned in June, replaced on bass by Darkness guitar tech Richie Edwards.
One Way Ticket, produced by classic-rock icon Roy Thomas Baker, shows the strain. Big ideas abound -- swollen orchestras; bagpipe-guitar action; armies of overdubbed Justins peeling the paint off your ceiling in massed falsetto -- but to often misguided effect. "Girlfriend" is lightweight glam overstuffed with strings and brass: Sweet (the band) without the sass. "Hazel Eyes" is just confused: Highland-jig rock with a Chinese-opera vocal twist. "Dinner Lady Arms" struts like a chip off Permission's "I Believe in a Thing Called Love," but the mix deadens the swagger. The guitars cut like penknives, not sabers, and Justin's vocal fireworks seem to go off behind the boom of the band, instead of way out front as they did on Permission.
Baker knows a lot about making monster rock with just bass, drums, a little piano, tightly coiled guitars and a high-altitude voice: He produced Queen's first four LPs. So it's hard to imagine what possessed him to smother Justin's Freddie Mercury aspirations in the philharmonic ballast of "Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time" and "Blind Man." And why, in the title track, stick an electric sitar where a slicing guitar break should have been? It makes hell sound like an Indian restaurant.
There are moments when the lusty son-of-Sheer Heart Attack that One Way Ticket might have been punches through the disarray, such as Justin's spearing vocal hook in "Knockers" (too bad about the locker-room title). The ridiculously fast "English Country Garden" is a blatant Queen homage and a close second to "Bald" in laughs and balls: soprano-pitch guitars and Justin in full Mercury-theater voice, shrieking "jardin! jardin!" (French for "garden") as he swings his plow all over the land. "She said, 'Have you got a match?'/I said, 'Yes,'" he boasts in the first verse. "'My cock and Farmer Giles' prizewinning marrow'" -- "marrow," in this case, meaning squash. You'll laugh, with him or at him. But you'll laugh.
"One Way Ticket," a cocaine memoir with the emphatic ring of autobiography, sums up everything that is bold but not quite right about this album. The bravado is unmistakable -- a chorus with the sold-out-arena kick of Def Leppard's "Rock Rock ('Til You Drop)"; explicit description of what's left after the high times ("Now my septum is in tatters and I've still got the runs") -- but so is the insecurity underneath. Metal bands usually wait four or five albums before singing in earnest about the high price of getting wasted. Two records into his career, Justin can't seem to sing about anything else. "The wheels came off, but I'm still on track," he swears in "One Way Ticket," then spends the rest of the record in desperation and indecision: trying to get it on again with an over-the-hill girlfriend in "Dinner Lady Arms" ("I couldn't figure out where your figure had gone"); spinning in self-pity on "Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time."
In the end, having gone through hell to make this record, the Darkness don't spend enough of it just raising hell, the vintage guitar-army way. Next time, I recommend less worry -- and no strings.
(Posted: Nov 28, 2005)
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- One Way Ticket
- Knockers
- Is It Just Me?
- Dinner Lady Arms
- Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time
- Hazel Eyes
- Bald
- Girlfriend
- English Country Garden
- Blind Man
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Review 1 of 6
Rasion writes:
If you're a fan of the Darkness, and you like their albums (like I DID), you sould ge see them live. Like I said, I no longer like their two albums... I have fallen in love with them. No, I am not a lonely person who can love nothing but music, but hte show they put on was insane. Unbelievable. One Way Ticket delivers everything you could want from a second album: the same hard rocking songs from Permission to Land, but with more diversity and heart. Songs like Hazel Eyes and Bald take the albums to the next level, with a completely amazing sound. The second track, Knockers, is reminiscent of Radio Ga-Ga by Queen... but better. Also, a Bon Scott era AC/DC is heard through One Way Ticket and Is It Just Me? Lets hope the boys can keep it up and deliver on their next album.
Apr 28, 2006 08:28:52
Review 2 of 6
alwin writes:
This is my favourite album of 2005. I hear some QUEEN and a little bit of SWEET. Everything on this album ist perfect.
Jan 6, 2006 03:41:03
Review 3 of 6
crobeg writes:
It's another 'Greatest Hits' album from The Darkness. And now they have enough material for a proper stadium show. I can't wait.
Dec 19, 2005 16:19:14
Review 4 of 6
Henrique writes:
Old-fashioned pure rock, from guitar solos to piano solos, reaches ballads and metal... you must at least buy it!
Dec 13, 2005 10:22:16
Review 5 of 6
lechman writes:
If you're looking for another "Permission to Land," this ain't it.
If you're looking for a great "second album" by a classic rock
band, you've got it. Listening to "Hell and Back" I got the same
feeling after Pearl Jam released their second album - "Whoa!
Where are all the one-off hits like 'Jeremy' and 'Evenflow? This
is not quite what I expected...but wait a minute, it isn't half-
bad, in fact this is pretty damned good stuff!"
That pretty much sums it up. Yes, the classic-riff rip-offs are
still shameless, the over-the-top vocals are even more over-
the-top. But what makes this a fantastic second album is the
new textures and tones that the Darkness are experimenting
with. They've combed the 70s and 80s and have reconstituted
those elements into a new experience that sounds as fresh
and vital as the original inpirations did (in "Is it Just Me" I
swear that's Randy Rhodes' guitar tone on the solo. Bloody
brilliant.) Beware though, even for a fan like me it took several
listens to really get it, and I think that's how it's supposed to
be. As always, the Darkness deliver a taste of the sweet and
leave you clamoring for more.
Dec 12, 2005 09:21:45
Review 6 of 6
FilmosopherILG writes:
This album has more personality and prowess than most of Queen's cds, and the song variations are clean, funny, and intuitive. THIS is the Darkness we've needed to hear. In regards to the RS review, I can't hear ANY fear in his voice. They're not trying to save their career, their fanbase is MONSTROUS. The strings in this album are beautiful, by the way. In a few years, you may just find yourself and some bar buddies singing a few of these tracks whilst shitfaced. People just don't understand it anymore....you don't have to have HARD ROCK in order to ROCK HARD. While there may be plenty of room for improvement, for right now, this album feels like a classic.
Dec 5, 2005 12:14:09
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