Damsel In The Dollhouse - Feast Of Villians

Based out of Montana, Damsel in the Dollhouse is Nina Tucciarelli. Another in the all too small group of female electro artists in this scene. Nina is the force behind Damsel with all the writing, composing, lyrics and programming done by her, Rob Robinson (Sergeant Sawtooth) is the live keyboardist and tales on the mastering duties. Add photography, burlesque and clothes design, Nina is a creative force in all areas.

However lets talk about the latest full length album Feast Of Villains. I admit I am late to this as it was released in May of 2016 and the independent radio shows of the world have been playing tracks from this album relentlessly and deservedly so. Feast Of Villains is a fantastic album. This is the fourth release from Damsel in the Dollhouse since 2010 and runs 13 tracks at just under 80 minutes of danceable, DJable electro songs that Tucciarelli has described as, "...celebrating some of my favorite maniacal characters from literature, television, and film."

'Room 237' and 'Bloodlust' (also released as videos) kick the album off with classic 80's basslines, sweeps and pads that have a vocal feel of Siouxsie while the third track 'Its A Good Day' punches us into a faster new wave sound reminiscent of Flock Of Seagulls and Ultravox but with cool female vox.

'Forever Knight' opens with dark church chant and organ feel followed by 'Lucifer' being full of distorted beats, samples and quick paced dark synths til we are bought back to a slower paced track 'Hannibal'.  'Mother' and 'Darkness' up the pace again and move the album along well with epic sweeps and groove.

'Lolita' ( for what its worth reminds me of Sigue Sigue Sputniks Atari Baby ), 'Pristine',  'Greed Is Good' and 'Villain' are clean and crisp atmospheric tracks that take us into the closer of the album. 'War Boy' starts as a dark electro grind which rises into a dark trance track before bringing us back into the electro grind again and finishes the album.

Damsel in the Dollhouse's album Feast Of Villains flows together well and has a theme behind it that makes sense and sits well in the track listing and pacing. All of the tracks can work in DJ sets if you are looking for that electro dark style with throwbacks to the New Wave and Euro Wave. While there may be a couple tracks that seem not to be at the highest level, that has more to do with there being 11 tracks that are all standout kickers. 

I love this album and it is on my list of "go to" albums to listen to as I know I'm going to enjoy the whole experience over and over again. All of Damsel in the Dollhouse's music is on Bandcamp and well worth checking out. Throw a few bucks to the artist if you can. There has been a 31 track remix album called Dessert: the Feats Of Villains Remixes released in November as well.

So go get some female fronted, voxed, written, produced, programmed electro goodness in you're ears. Its well worth it. 
Feb 07 2017