Twice Dark - Orphans of the Storm

The biggest reward we get off of Twice Dark’s EP is the instrumental sections of his songs. For example, ‘Spiders’ is a grand blend of darkwave and industrial music. Taking the gothic inspired beats of darkwave and subjecting them to the gut punching fury of industrial percussion is a great choice. ‘Casualty’ continues that effort with some excellent kick drums supplying a dose of hardened bass to the gothrock riddled track. But even when the beat lessens its dance presence, the album does not fail to impress, such as on ‘Orphans of the Storm’. More melancholic in its delivery; a bit of a sad but hopeful track. 

‘Ghosts in the Graveyard’ utilizes whirling synths to create that spooky vibe that so many goths take for granted during the Halloween season. And the percussion really fucking rocks on this song; in fact, I walked away from this album with this song as my favorite. The final original track on the album is a classic darkwave dance track to get goths stomping their overly sized and obnoxious boots on the dancefloor. Plenty of bright synths and dance beats to get the floor going. The final song on the album is a remix of ‘Plague’ by HYPNAGOGIA. Wasn’t a fan of this one at all; it sounds as if the production went five steps back and sounds like an unfinished demo that’s raw to a touch. 

A complaint that I had throughout the album that I didn’t want to repeat throughout the review is what I consider a “scene crusher”; a blight that plagues many industrial releases both independent and large. And that it Twice Dark’s vocals. They get the job done, that’s for sure, but don’t expect anything new, unique, or above mediocre value. Twice Dark does a lot of what I like to call “almost spoken word” vocals and when he does go off during some of the choruses, such as on ‘Spiders’, it doesn’t sound great. It's a sin that really becomes noticeable and almost unbearable on ‘Orphans of the Storm’. Passable at best for industrial music, but nothing that’s going to stick in my head for long.  

I do think there’s some room for improvement on production value; it’s not as crisp as it could be. I always state in my reviews that I’m no audio engineer, but when sounds fizz and have audible feedback in comparison to other releases in the scene, that’s no good. Again, slight adjustments need to be made here and there, but it’s nothing crazy. 

This is a fun album that has a few flaws. I’ll repeat myself by saying that Twice Dark needs to figure out his vocals and find something fun that he can do with them (or take lessons), and that he could step production up just a bit. BUT, his instrumentals are phenomenal, punchy, and addictive. Take it for what you will, but I’m looking forward to seeing him improve in the future.