by Dan Goldin (@paintingwithdan)
There aren’t a ton of modern bands that have progressed their sound as much as The Drin have over the past six years. The Cincinnati based project led by Dylan McCartney have never abandoned their roots, they’ve merely been mutating, evolving, and expanding on their sound. Revolving between haunting and claustrophobic lo-fi, gothic post-punk, seismic krautrock, and shadowy basement-tinged psych, the band find space in the darker corners, but they never feel held to them.
If the sun shines every now and then on I Lost My Way For Centuries, the sextet’s upcoming album, you get the impression that it’s okay. Due out September 18th via Feel It Records (Spread Joy, Why Bother, Team Work), The Drin are still operating within shades of grey, but there’s more nuance to be found than ever before on their sprawling double album. With 23 songs and over 74 minutes of music, the record presents The Drin at their dynamic best, an oozing blend of their sound’s past present and future. The record feels as indebted to Alan Vega or Spacemen 3 as it does Neil Young and Crazy Horse or The Velvet Underground, and yet its unmistakably The Drin that we all feel for with their first three records.
“Prophets of Doom,” the record’s second single (following “Haven’t Lived It Yet”) finds The Drin in hypnotic free fall, a bluesy gutter dirge that laments being “born to late”. With clamoring saxophone and no-wave inspired guitar sludge thick enough to paint the walls, the band burn a path through the racket wide enough for McCartney’s vocal melody to rattle and stick. The song careens and grooves with an off-balanced stumble, in no rush to get anywhere particular, but keeping a sense of momentum all the same. The swampy tone and amorphous structure of it lead into a piercing crescendo, the smoke of it all filling our lungs and consuming us in their haze.