Children Of The Night

These days it's difficult — let's say downright impossible — to keep up with everything happening in the dark scene, especially since there are so many corners to cover: disparate micro-scenes, music unearthed in the most remote corners of the globe and of the web, do-it-yourself and indie circuits, and of course whatever remains of the mainstream.

Decades on, Joy Division & co. still influence young musicians, while the "goth" label — once the exclusive preserve of a movement with precise stylistic and (counter)cultural coordinates — increasingly crops up in other contexts. After all, themes like the bleakest introspection and decadent romanticism are transversal by nature, running through centuries of artistic movements.

So here's a brief recap of some of the most interesting recent dark releases, a list that, as ever, is far from exhaustive and, as always, welcomes your contributions in the comments section.

“Listen to them – children of the night. What music they make”.

Carla Dal Forno (Berlin — Germany)

Despite the name, she's not one of our fellow countrywomen, but rather an Australian musician who has long since relocated to Berlin.

Carla Dal Forno boasts a classical training (as a cellist), but also time spent in indie/lo-fi bands (Melbourne's Mole House) and ambient/experimental outfits (F Ingers). The territory she works in is the — by now rather overexposed — darkest, most ambient end of synth-wave, but her musical background lets her enrich her sound with a mix of influences: from noise to drone, from soundtrack to ethereal.

All her recordings to date have come out on Blackest Ever Black: the excellent full-length "You Know What It's Like" (2016) and two EPs, "Fast Moving Cars", also from 2016, and "The Garden" (2017).

Fearing (Oakland — USA)

Among the bands featured in this special, California's Fearing are the dreamiest, blending shoegaze with atmospheric wave. So far they've only released two EPs (the cassette "A Life Of None" and the 12" "Black Sand") on Funeral Party Records, a label with a solid roster of "contemporary goths", including Soft Kill and Night Sins.

Poised between dark-rock and hazy post-punk, Fearing don't add anything experimental to the genre, but they hit the mark, showing real sensitivity and skill in capturing the shades of black typical of this sound. Their background, rigorously hardcore-diy, is one that will crop up several times in this article, proof of just how fertile this scene is and how much it keeps contributing to music's "dark side".

Fotocrime (Louisville — USA)

Another band with a background outside the goth circuit: Fotocrime is in fact the new project of Ryan Patterson, frontman of post-hardcore trio Coliseum for over a decade.

Given that premise, you'd expect anything except an album for gothic-rock purists — and yet that's exactly what it is: stylistic coordinates straight out of Sisters Of Mercy and Mission, both in the sound and in Patterson's cavernous voice.

What makes the difference here are personality and songwriting, and in that respect Fotocrime don't disappoint: "Always Night", their latest EP, is a well-crafted work that's bound to please fans of this sound. Also worth noting is the counterpoint provided by bassist Shelley Anderson's voice, featured on a few tracks.

Last May 18th saw the release of their debut full-length, "Principle Of Pain", again on Golden Antenna Records.

Havah (Forlì – Italy)

The brainchild of Forlì native Michele Camorani, also drummer for cult screamo bands like La Quiete and Raein. Starting out in 2010 with the self-produced "Adriatic Sea No Surf", a work in the vein of the era's shitgaze sound of Blank Dogs and similar acts, he made a turn in 2012 (with "Settimana") towards Italian-language vocals and darkwave sonorities, though the lo-fi production remained a trademark.

The third full-length, "Durante un assedio" (2014), released – like its predecessor – by To Lose La Track, offers a cleaner sound while keeping Havah's mood intact. "Contravveleno", the new album, came out last September on Bologna's Maple Death Records. Soundscapes echoing "sacred monsters" like Cure and Joy Division pair with Camorani's deep voice, which narrates a concept about the Italian Resistance: a successful comeback.

Koban (Vancouver – Canada)

In recent years Canada has proven prolific both in the synth-wave field (from Montréal, the talented Automelodi and Marie Davidson) and in more "unruly" territory: Vancouver is indeed home base for excellent acts like White Lung and Spectres.

Two scenes ideally combined by the dark, fast-paced Koban: Brittany Westgarth and Sam Buss channel punk urgency into a sharp formula embellished with icy synth touches. A sound that has led some on Bandcamp to dub them "the Motorhead of darkwave". Their second album, "Abject Obsession" (released by Avant! Records in 2016), presents a cleaner sound that sheds some of the lo-fi patina of their rougher early work, but is no less effective.

Shapeless Void (Milan/Brescia – Italy)

Back to Italy with the quartet Shapeless Void, orbiting the Milan-Brescia axis since 2014. Their formula rests on grafting distinctly noir and psychedelic moods onto 2000s indie-rock (the nu new wave of Interpol, Editors, etc.).

A cross-cutting concept, well suited to the times: it's no surprise, then, to catch echoes of Beatles and Joy Division in a well-blended sound marked by meticulous attention to the guitar work (with a nod here to the rockier side of the Nineties too).

Two EPs to their name so far: "Oberheim" (2015) and "Telema" (2016), unreservedly recommended to fans of the neo-psych sound of bands like Black Angels and Toy.

Tempers (New York – USA)

The duo of Jasmine Golestaneh and Eddie Cooper made their debut a couple of years ago with "Services" (Aufnahme + Wiedergabe), an album steeped in elegant, dark wave and enriched by vocals tinged with melancholy that nonetheless know how to "cut through" the fabric woven by the synths.

In early 2017 came the EP "Fundamental Fantasy", released on Vinyl Factory; the cover art shows them on the island of Stromboli, the setting for the "Volcano Extravaganza" festival that hosted them the previous summer. And it's precisely there that the new record was conceived: a record that continues the Tempers' path in the spirit of their Eighties roots, sounds that are undoubtedly familiar, handled with skill and personality. A synth-pop with noir shades unfolding across five tracks, including a remix; a refined "preview" while we await their next full-length.

Underpass (San Diego – USA)

The Cure of “Seventeen Seconds” are the main reference point for this Californian ensemble: the lesson of Smith & co., dark masters whose influence is impossible to avoid, is here reinterpreted through an anarcho/positive-punk lens. Underpass's music in fact harks back to that historical phase when the “British bats” crossed paths with their countrymen released by Crass Records: Mob and Zounds above all, that is, shadowy atmospheres delivered with punk swagger. The “novelty” here is the influence of certain Scandinavian releases from the 2010s (the Copenhagen scene: Iceage, Lower & co.).

Starting out with a cassette in October 2013 (“About Violence”), they released their latest album, “Red Reflection”, two years ago, followed by the single “Your Silence” and some excellent sessions for the radio show “Part Time Punks”.

Matteo Vallicelli (Forlì/Berlin – Germany)

Matteo Vallicelli's background, the second musician from Forlì in this article, lies in garage-punk: he spent years playing drums in Wildmen and Smart Cops. More recently he's collaborated with noise-rock outfit Death Index and with Luis Vasquez's Soft Moon.

Since 2013 he's been based in Berlin, in Kreuzberg: a setting that has helped shape his musical output and led to a solo debut in a new guise. The full-length “Primo” was in fact made entirely with drum machine and synths, a decisive turn toward electronics with kraut, cosmic shadings. Catchy, pulsing sounds, perfectly balanced between soundtrack and dancefloor, without shying away from the occasional noise excursion: an introspective retro-wave that displays a wide array of influences. The EP “47100”, released in June 2017, features a contribution from guitarist Giuseppe Coluccelli, also from Forlì, coming from the screamo/post-core scene (the aforementioned Raein).

Zotz (Mexico City – Mexico)

Music for lovers of deathrock with a crust/anarcho-punk pedigree: Lost Tribe, Anasazi, Belgrado… are just a few of the names that have breathed new life into a (micro)scene too often turned in on itself.

Once again, nothing new is being invented, but that's hardly a problem for fans: there are never too many new bands for those chasing the dark-punk attitude. And in this case, the songs are genuinely there. Dark music, conceived in the shade of a scorching sun: this time, instead of the Californian peninsula (Christian Death, 45 Grave etc.), we head further south, all the way to Mexico City, home base of Zotz, whose members are or have been active in various local crust and hardcore-punk bands. In May 2017 the cassette “14-17” came out on the prolific Detriti Records, a tape label based in Berlin but run by Italian musician Davide Lace, aka Words And Actions.

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