Rock music has been around since Chuck Berry picked up an electric guitar in the mid-1950’s and throughout the course of the following 60-plus years it has undergone numerous transformations, evolutions, and reiterations. It has come out of arenas and garages, it has been spawned in the darkest places of musicians’ minds and has been adored by throngs of screaming, teenage girls. Rock has seemed to run the gamut when it comes to stylistic approaches and inspirational sources so in order to find something new and distinct it takes some ingenuity and bravery.
Dutch, dark rock/post-everything band, GOLD, are looking to carve out their vein in rock music by siphoning established genres while adding heavy distortion and brooding, gloomy vocals. They formed in 2011 when former The Devil’s Blood member Thomas Sciarone and Milena Eva set out to make music as a monument to the decline of civilization. Eva has a unique, sanguine voice that adds a fervent emotion to an entrancing rhythm section formed by a trio of guitars played by Sciarone, Nick Polak, and Kamiel Top as well as bassist Tim Meijer and drummer Igor Woulters. Together, this Rotterdam sextet have completed their second and more diverse studio album entitled No Image.
Initially, it is important to note that GOLD’s second studio album is noticeably different from their debut album, Interbellum. Their darker tone on No Image contrasts that of the psych/hard rock Interbellum. A large part of that comes from the band’s eagerness to explore a darker sound on this new album and another part comes from the production crew that was brought in. Jeff Ziegler, who has worked with The War on Drugs and Kurt Vile, and Brad Boatright, who has worked with the mighty YOB and Sunn O)), were added to the overall production crew. These indie rock and heavier metal influences, respectively, change the overall dynamic for GOLD and allow them to subvert typical genres with distorted fuzz and soulful vocals.
“No Image is the darkest and prettiest work I ever was a part of. It’s a naked document of the emotional struggles of a forward thinking soul in a backwards world, where seclusion and isolation always lurk.” – Milena Eva
No genre is spared on No Image. Tapping into indie and experimental rock as well as punk and black metal, GOLD fuse and meld each of the ten tracks into their own hybrid creatures of darkness and beauty. “Old Habits” is trance-inducing in its cadence, full of feedback-forging guitars, metronomic drums, and an oft-repeated chorus. Feature tracks, “Shapeless” and “The Controller” show off a greater affinity towards post-black metal stylings and “Tar and Feather” opens on outright, experimental black metal before transitioning into a moodier post-punk beat. While each of these songs are simply highlighted here, it goes to exemplify the wide array GOLD covers in just over 42 minutes.
No Image is innovative in its delivery and creates a sound that is idiosyncratic to GOLD’s desire and courage to blaze trails in rock music. It is rife with inspirations from numerous brands of rock and metal and tackles emotional/mental concepts of loneliness, love, and defunct expectation. No Image is much more raw and heavy, with drone tinges and fuzzy post-punk make that GOLD a much more unique entity than other female-fronted bands that typically resort to psych rock. If this album marks a new path that GOLD is choosing to travel, then I want to go on that journey with them. No Image is already officially out in Europe through Van Records and is released today in North America through Profound Lore Records.
Rating: 4/5