Demo Review

The Darvaza Hole – Demo 2011The Darvaza Hole – Demo 2011

The Darvaza Hole are a new progressive alternative rock band from Southend, Essex who are relentlessly touring the toilet sized venue circuit in and out of Essex and the London area, the band are made up of Laura Coban on vocals and bass, Richard Jones on guitar and backing vocals and Steve Dews on drums.

The band released their first demo back in late 2011 and it features 4 solid sounding songs which run for a total of just over 21 minutes and throughout you can clearly hear the talent this three piece have with Coban’s beautifully flowing vocals and effective bass lines, Jones’ amazing yet unpredictable guitar riffs and Dews’ strong forceful drum beats.

The demo kicks off with ‘I Dream Idol’ which happens to be a progressive masterpiece which runs for just under 5 minutes, the song opens with a 20 second instrumental piece before Cobans vocals come in and soar throughout. As the song progresses the guitar riffs start sounding bigger and more forceful as the band come together for some truly amazing instrumental work.

‘Observational Frame Of Reference’ is the track where Jones really gets to shine with his guitar work as he truly rocks out with some fantastic build ups which Coban compliments with her infectious vocals during the chorus where she can be heard singing “In your head, in your head, your head” with so much passion.

‘Get Away’ is the token slow track on the demo but saying that it’s not that slow it’s just a lot slower and softer sounding than the other tracks on offer, after some frantic drums beats Coban takes full advantage of the near silent airwaves in places and lets out some great vocals whilst the banging drums and quirky guitar riffs waste no time building up around her which pretty much sets the pace of a song that is full of many build ups and break downs.

The demo closes with ‘Cohiba Man’ a song which has an infectious poppy edge throughout and from the start you will notice that Coban has taken a different approach with her vocals as they flow extremely fast with a catchy twist to them, whilst the instrumental work flows as well as ever..

It is pretty hard to pick a favourite track from the demo as each track stands out on its own for different reasons but in my eyes ‘I Dream Idol’ is the strongest sounding track in the way that it opens the demo up in an epic way and sets the pace for what is followed.

Overall the The Darvaza Hole demo features some great tracks, the only downside that I can see is the quality of the recording which could do with a bit more clarity and being ‘anchored down’ by boosting up the bass. However, for a debut demo these technical errors are to be expected and at the end of the day the demo clearly shows that The Darvaza Hole know how to write music as they are a dab hand at writing epic sounding songs, if you like bands with the progressive sounds of the Mars Volta and the grunge feel of Japanese Voyeurs then I seriously recommend that you check The Darvaza Hole out.

4/5

Review by Trigger

 Band Members

Laura Coban
Steve Dewis
Richard Jones
 Track Listing
1. I Dream Idol
2. Observational Frame Of Reference
3. Get Away
4. Cohiba Man
 Band Related Links
The Darvaza Hole Facebook
 Review Score Code
- Top Cheese
- Brilliant
- Pretty damn good
- Ok I guess
- What Was That?