For many years now, guitar music and electronic production have followed divergent, even antagonistic paths. Daft Punk seems like a distant historical phenomenon, and Underworld and Seefeel didn’t really bother with guitars in their latest albums. But for a freeform, genre-bending band, distilling any element from music history into their magic potion wouldn’t be that hard. And for over a decade, Darkside has been doing this ingeniously. Nicolás Jaar’s ambient, airy electronica has paired effortlessly with Dave Harrington’s vintage guitar licks. The duo (now a trio with Tlacael Esparza on drums) seems uninterested in the trend of completely ditching guitars (and even drums) in electronic music.
Though beginning as a jam band, with Harrington initially serving as Jaar’s session guitarist for his solo project, they soon succeeded in morphing their shared ambitions into a band of swirling guitars and ethereal electronics. For Nothing, they’re joined by their drummer from Live at Spiral House to fully explore their countercurrent journey. To my ears, they sound funkier with each new album, transitioning from Psychic to Nothing through Spiral.
On Nothing, from the onset, we can hear the effect of adding drums to Darkside’s vaporous atmosphere, giving it a more solid, structured feel as drum rolls are heard in ‘Slau’. ‘S.N.C.’ and ‘Are You Tired? (Keep on Singing)’ are both examples of the distinct guitar riffs mentioned earlier, woven into the album. The former, the funkier one, is partly a rework of Duke Jupiter’s ‘Rock ’n’ Roll Band,’ which is itself an ironic take on rock artists’ pipe dreams. The latter is a strange meditation on “stolen land”, featuring many bluesy licks and elements vaguely reminiscent of Andean percussion. Both have music videos featuring the crystal ball/snowglobe from the cover. The ‘S.N.C.’ video distorts through the vision of this ball, while the other one unfolds like an endless fractal of marbles.
Although Darkside is not a dance act, ‘Hell Suite (Part 1)’ is as rhythmically engaging as any 18th-century suite. With its updated interpretation of Lennon’s ‘Imagine’, Jaar once again showcases his witty lyric-writing skills, demonstrating his understanding that where “there’s no heaven,” it “doesn’t take much” to “imagine all the people living in hell”.
Nothing is another manifestation of Jaar and Harrington’s efforts to preserve a harmonious fusion of rock and electronics, without compromising either side. And ‘Sin El Sol No Hay Nada’, as the album closer, takes this endeavor even further with its noise-heavy, ear-shattering sound.
