Dame Area
Toda La Verdad Sobre Dame Area
Mannequin Records
Silvia Konstance and Viktor L. Crux’s 2022 Dame Area LP was titled Toda La Mentira Sobre Dame Area, or “All the Lies About Dame Area”, perhaps an attempt to wryly acknowledge the softer and more melodic focus of that record in opposition to the clamor of the Catalan duo’s preceding synthpunk and post-industrial albums. 2024’s Toda la verdad sobre Dame Area (“The Whole Truth about Dame Area”) returns to their noisier sound, bringing some of the lessons of its predecessor with it in terms of design and production, while upping the intensity by a considerable margin. Still using a toolset made up primarily of metallic and electronic percussion, minimal synth arrangements and the powerful voice of Silvia Konstance, Dame Area have never sounded this big, or this dangerous.
That sense of menace pervades every aspect of the LP, in both its most unhinged and quietest moments. A cut like “Esto es nuestro ruido” comes out of the gate swinging with distorted kicks and a repeating two note synth sequence that grows more manic with each passing moment, the track crescendoing when Konstance’s yelled chants are subsumed by waves of sculpted static and rhythmic-noise like drum patterns. Conversely “Vengo dall’aldilà” uses ominous, soundtracky bells and synth strings to create an atmosphere of peril around its organic drum sounds, its vocals kept in a sneering, far more dismissive than threatening and somehow more unnerving for it. The rhythm programming is dense and fast-moving, frequently switching between synthetic and organic hits in ways that keep things musically engaging. That variation gives a track like “Urlo di guerra” dimensionality; the change-ups between screeching sirens, thudding drum machine sounds and sampled clanks preventing monotony or exhaustion.
The other key to the record’s appeal is in how Dame Area find ways to make their mechanized sound feel organic. Yes, the arrangement of drum sounds on “Devoción” is tightly quantized with engine-like precision, and yet the track never feels like it’s out of step with the screamed vocals, keeping them aloft instead of dragging them under. Similarly the bassline that pushes “Tú me hiciste creer” feels like it’s reinforcing the song’s shrieks and squeals, eventually leading to a rough landing on a field of coarse synth pads that almost feel like massive distorted sighs of relief.
And really that’s the most remarkable thing about Toda La Verdad Sobre Dame Area; it’s a record that feels relentless and ferocious, but never taxing. The production and mix really allow the listener inside the tracks, making them an active part of its pummeling, thudding attack instead of the subject. Certainly their best statement to date, Dame Area set out to tell truths that are all the more bracing and invigorating for their intensity. Recommended.
