[edit: the mp3 is in fact a rip of a stream. it can be heard directly at the darkness's myspace site.]

the darkness - "one way ticket" (from the one way ticket to hell and back lp, import available for preorder here.)

caveat auditor : the sound quality of this poor. it's probably a recording of a radio airing or a rip of a webcast.

in brief : "this town ain't big enough for both of us" might have clued one in. you might argue that the warning signs were there earlier.

i find music impossible to like for ironic reasons. aside from the principle of the thing, there's just not enough time in the day and, as junior senior sing, "too much good stuff out there to ignore."

that said, i really love several the darkness songs--i imagine they'd rather have the definite article there than not--particularly "growing on me" and the christmas song. "growing on me" is just fantastic guitar pop, and justin hawkins sounds like robert smith on it; the christmas song is ridiculous, verging on ironic, but so is our celebration of christmas these days, and, like saint etienne, the darkness are just one of those bands born, like the baby jesus, for christmas. what i didn't quite dig, and maybe it's b/c i don't drink at bars, was the big hit record in the u.s., "i believe in a thing called love. i believe that justin hawkins loves christmas; he didn't quite convince me about the whole love thing. unlike, say, andrew w.k., hawkins, who i really wanted to believe in, lacks basic credulity (though i should have suspected this all along from a champion karaoke performer).

"one way ticket" (to hell and back, no less) is an ill harbinger for the forthcoming album. if the darkness are an ideal band for christmas, they are also an ideal band to fall victim to the sophomore slump, and it all begins w/ the frontman. in his bedroom, and on the karaoke stage, justin hawkins always dreamed of himself as a star, and now he is, and now we all must suffer. at one time, i would have thought the title clever, but now i'm unsure if he just made a mistake, like oasis w/ standing on the shoulder of giants, and the darkness are rather early on in their career to already be having a "stonehenge" moment. maybe, though, their time nearly up, they must cram it all into a short amount of time.

"one way ticket" gives no sign that they're here to stay, like, forever. as if the cover of "this town ain't big enough for both of us" wasn't bad enough," "one way ticket" does nothing so much but remind one of eddie money's "two tickets to paradise" and, AND, get this! pales in comparison. the obvious role model for this sort of thing, and it's a verifiable fact, is meat loaf's "bat out of hell," but that would take ambition, talent, and commitment to a project. perhaps this is overly caustic b/c i'm bitter that the veil has dropped and i at last see things for what they are; perhaps it's the poor sound quality that diminishes the track's value. either way, let it be known: the darkness are now on watch. i mean, say what you want about eddie money, but at least he means it, man.