Next up: Darkness a la Hoaxed
Spooky season ’22 just passed and a majority of people are content to switch gears and are beginning to think of warm gatherings, feasts and feelings of thankfulness.
However, sometimes a bump in the night in your sleepy residence is enough to jolt your memory that spooky things don’t just go away when Halloween ends. Enter figurative specters, the Rock band Hoaxed, and their vivid debut album, “Two Shadows.”
Comprised of vocalist/guitarist Kat Keo and drummer Kim Coffel, the Hoaxed power duo hails from Portland, Ore. Using the worldwide isolation from the Coronavirus, in 2020, to enact their plans of sonic domination, the band came together and wrote material that culminated with a foursong EP that was released last year.
Not long after, Hoaxed signed with Relapse Records. So far, the ingredients of their bubbling, musical serum beg to defy classification. That’s mostly unavoidable since Hoaxed has just gone mainstream. So, the band’s style is closely equated to Rock n’ Roll with dashes of Goth Rock, Metal and with some Americana elements mixed in.
Released, on Oct. 28, the album, “Two Shadows” opens with a short instrumental title track. Howling wind, gloomy pipes/percussion and intensifying choral harmonies tease for something coming akin to Black Metal, such as soaring power vocals and bludgeoning, heavy rhythms.
What alternatively unfolds in just under 30 minutes, are nine tracks of well constructed, dark and accessible Rock. The title track is the setting of the album, “an eerie place wandering souls happen upon, a bridge between the land of the living and the restless afterlife, where you may suddenly find yourself with two shadows; your shadow and an ominous second shadow,” Coffel explained in press material leading up to the band’s debut, fulllength release.
With the setting in place, “The Call” follows that initial idea. Like the fluttering of an anxious heart, Coffel’s thunderous rhythm keeps the song’s spirit alive. Keo’s driving riffs and smooth vocals tell the tale of a shadow beckoning to you: an irresistible summons from beyond flames and time.
Coffel’s choppy rhythms particularly shine on “The Knowing.” A cautious, tempo-shifter complemented by somewhat distorted guitar, Keo
explained in the press material, “It’s human nature to be curious about the path your life will take and how you can influence it. This song cautions around digging into practices you don’t understand.”
For prime examples of Hoaxed’s scope of variety, queue up “For Love,” “Grand Illusions” and “High Seas.”
Plus, there’s an honorable mention in “Where Good Won’t Go,” which is probably the most brutal-sounding of all songs herein.
“For Love” simmers with a driving, bar bandlike force and dark lyricism such as, “Approaching, cloaked in despair/ Eyes down in passionate prayer/ Lips move in indistinct curses/ Drawing closer to the purpose ... Would you die for love, Will you kill for love?”
Simultaneously, “Grand Illusions” is radio-worthy Rock flirting with Punk that has a cautionary message about impermanence and the nature of broken promises.
Not forgotten, “High Seas,” begins with the immersive sound of waves. Thanks to Coffel, it morphs into a head-nodding, notquite-banging rhythm. Keo, then, takes on a more aggressive guitar tone. Her vivid, dark lyrics, “The dead don’t speak here/ They keep their secrets/ Look to the waves for the meaning ... The debt will come due/ when death favors you” prove that you don’t need a shock rock shtick this decade to make quality gloomy music.”