Unonou by Danava

Totally awesome and weird album art for Danava's second album Unonou.

Track Listing
01 - Unonou
02 - Where Beauty And Terror Dance
03 - The Emerald Snow Of Sleep
04 - A High Or A Low
05 - Spinning Temple Shifting
06 - Down From A Cloud, Up From The Ground
07 - One Mind Gone Separate Ways

-"Rock is back!"
...at least that's what all the rock blogs are saying when they sing Danava's musical praises. Yes it's true...Portland's Danava is that awesome mix of 70's proggy, druggy, doom-y, metal up your ass, and hard rock licks like Deep Purple and Yes, Iron maiden and Queen whipped into a rock n' roll smoothie. But it's fucking 2009 man!! I'm happy. It's like...ok here is a "new" band that genuinely sounds like a tripped out 70's hard rock band. It's now possible to see live music that is original and new but still get that classic rock element that has been missing from my life for far too long.

Unonou is Danva's second album. It's a little better produced and put together than their self titled debut release, but both kick-ass!! I'm sorta leaning twords liking their debut more than Unonou -it's more rock and roll and Unonou is a little more "out there" and progressive. But this review is about Unonou suckers.

Unonou is a made-up word straight from lead singer/guitarist Dusty Sparkle's fascinating mind-grapes. The title track, is a sabbath bass line and vocal style/melody laden song. In fact, as I write this review...I'm realizing a lot of similarities between the two bands. But Danava borrows from a lot of 70's bands, most notably their brian may (queen) style guitar on some songs (mostly from their debut), they go into some repetitive, Dave murray (maiden) style guitar work, but vocally -Dusty Sparkles is all Ozzy. I'm not crazy about the "off-key" thin and whiny vocal style of both ozzy and dusty but Danava (and sabbath) both make up for that in creative "opus-like" songs (some Danava tapping out over 13 min!). Danava also makes great use of synthesizers, like in the masterpiece Where Beauty and Terror Dance...the hard rockin' track goes into a spacey, dreamlike synthesized trance at the end of the song, almost reminiscent of Hawkwind's early stuff.

The Emerald Snow of Sleep is the hardest song for me to like... The out of key, straight-up whiny vocals are just too dissonant for my ears to handle, and the repetitive "beeping" synthesizer noises are just irritating. But to Emerald's credit, the song does pay off with a serious fuzzy bass and lead guitar battle, ending in a catchy horn section jam at the close. Neat! A High or a Low is a fuckin' tight as hell, sweet little track, my favorite from the album. Are those bicycle bells I hear in there? A real catchy bass riff, major and minor sounding at the same time, and another kick-ass horn section ending. It's like chicago meets deep purple and they do a shit ton of acid together.

Spinning Temple Spinning is again, "too out there", for me to really get into. "out" melody line, big psychedelic stew jam session...but love the totally evil sounding guitar's chord progression half way through...this song is a little schizophrenic (like a lot of Danava's music). It gets heavy on the doom factor half way though, which makes me happy -I'll gladly choose that style over the psychedelic jam out shit any day.

Down from a Cloud, Up From the Ground is one of Danava's masterpieces. It starts off real jammy but then morphs into a freddy mercury and Queen-esque dramatic rock opera but waaay heavier, creepier and space-ier than queen ever dreamed of getting. Great "phantom of the opera" style synth/organ work that makes my spine tingle. Nothing gets me higher than creeped out rock infused harpsichord work. Think an extended, more delicate, Mr. Crowley by Ozzy. The song then morphs into a faster paced, hard rockin' maiden style guitar riff laden jam out, but with Danava's unique twist on it.

One Mind Gone Seperate Ways is truly the album's piece de resistance (I don't say or spell it all snooty and french like, ass). Move over Tubular Bells! Here comes One Mind! Holy shit, what a fuckin' mind-fuck of a song. The title kind of says it all. This track is all over the place...it can't decide if it's rocked out classical music, a proggy early genesis or yes style "joint", a spaced out pink floyd style jam...but in the end, it's pure Danava. No other band can blend all styles of rock music into one seamless masterpiece, quite like Danava does. Even with the big jumble of styles, the melody remains a cohesive part of this song and it never loses it's focus even through endless time signature and key changes. Topping in at 13:28...get that doobie rocket ready to blast off cause One Mind is one weird trip, motherfunker.

Although I've compared Danava to about 10 different bands in this review of Unonou, Danava is uniquely their own sound. They may "borrow" styles from some of the greats, but they have the common sense and the straight-up fucking talent to make their songs their own. Please play in Boston!!