[Click play above to stream premiere of the title-track from Danava’s Nothing But Nothing. Album is out April 28 on Tee Pee Records, with preorders here.]

Now we know what the fire emoji was made for. Some bands burn churches, Danava burn barns to a point of near-exclusivity (they’ve also been through a number of rhythm guitarists). The Portland, Oregon, troupe led by guitarist/vocalist Greg Meleney have been at it to one degree or other for 20 years as of 2023, and in that time have moved from hipster metal upstart invaders — yes, they were on that compilation in ’06, alongside Kemado denizens like The Sword and Saviours who had headbangers clutching purist pearls in the mid-aughts — to being elder statesmen of the Pacific Northwest underground and a band who’ve helped teach an entire generation how to throw down, influential in sound and work ethic.

That’s not nothing, but Nothing But Nothing is the first Danava record in 12 years, and arrives through Tee Pee Records with suitable anticipation; a studio return for an act who’ve spent plenty of the decade-plus since 2011’s third album, Hemisphere of Shadows, on tour, and which encapsulates and pushes deeper into the classic metallurgy Meleney and company have fostered since their 2006 self-titled so brazenly engaged thrash with vintage-style production and heavy rock tonality.

Comprising eight songs that run — emphasis on ‘run’ there as regards meter and general urgency; 12 years later they’ve got no time to waste — an LP-friendly 42 minutes, Danava‘s fourth full-length leans with ferocity into the band’s established metallic modus, Meleney (who also co-produced with Evan Mersky at Red Lantern in Portland) and follow-guitarist Kerby Strom igniting fretboards with overarching fleetness of finger, shredding with righteous glee across hot-shit singles like the leadoff title-track (premiering above), “Let the Good Times Kill,” “At Midnight You Die,” which was issued as a standalone in 2016 (review here), and the subsequent side B rippers “Strange Killer” and “Nuthin But Nuthin,” the latter a fitting companion to the opener that’s nonetheless a completely different song, positioned with just the maybe-Slovak-language blues rocker “Čas” behind it to close out.

The threat is made plain with the art by Richard Clifton-Dey (Blue Öyster Cult, many pulp book covers) out front as much as the lyrics to “At Midnight You Die” or “Strange Killer,” and with bassist Dominic Casciato and drummer Matthew Oliver — who is all over that bell of the ride cymbal in the hooky “Strange Killer” — in the propulsive rhythm section, Danava have never sounded so outwardly sharp. Where Hemisphere of Shadows basked in a rawer style in terms of the recording, Nothing But Nothing feels daring in its cleanliness and hard-edged presentation, letting the careening riffs that start on second-one of “Nothing But Nothing” and define much of the work here speak for themselves with resounding lucidity. One wouldn’t call it polished in a pop sense, but on the scale of Danava‘s own discography, it’s a definite and willful-feeling shift in intention and a choice that serves the songs well, the frenzied opener scorching the ground with still-accessible intensity en route to “Let the Good Times Kill,” the chorus of which reminds of Belladonna-era Anthrax in its head-down charge and no-room-for-bullshit mindset.

Force and momentum, gravity, thrust and g-o-spells-go, Danava use speed to knock their listeners off-balance at that outset, and in cuts like the duly-screaming instrumental “Season of Vengeance” and in the culminating solo of keyboard-laced side A closer “Enchanted Villain” that’s backed by a last chorus to complete its 6:58 stretch as the longest track here — a lead line bookends that reminds of whatever it is that opens Ross the Boss‘ show on Gimme Metal, but is roughed up and more for speed than grandiosity — they are outright dizzying in a way that can’t help but surge adrenaline.

“Enchanted Villain” lands that blow feeling like an arrival after the sprint that is “Season of Vengeance” — marked by the kind of turns that make most guitarists very, very angry in the studio — and its synthy middle underscores the ’80s metal vibe, rising out of harmonized guitars in the hook with a “Heaven and Hell”-ish chug behind and no time to waste, successfully conveying its titular enchantment before bringing the chug back to the forefront and making its way into its next solo and ending at about five and a half minutes in.

Of course, Nothing But Nothing isn’t all speed-metal haranguing, rampant memorable hooks and murderous-but-not-really lyrical themes, even if it’s mostly that. The finale “Čas” has already been noted as a departure linguistically, and its correspondingly quiet guitar intro, subdued verse and actually-midtempo roll — even Meleney‘s solo seems to try to restrain itself — are no less distinguished from the bulk of what precedes. Easing the transition there is “Nuthin But Nuthin,” which reimagines Judas Priest and Mk II Deep Purple as the same band; organ, brooding verse, gang-shout fist-pumper hook that delivers the title-line in a way that “Nothing But Nothing” shied away from in launching the album, brazen in its groove and aware of that which it speaks in terms of the influences it’s working from. And at the start of side B, “At Midnight You Die” is plenty fast but more NWOBHM than thrash, while “Strange Killer” lets up on the throttle some and is less jaw-clenched in its verse and own departure into fanfare, a choral part taking hold at 3:47 into the total 6:45 that’s there and gone in the spirit of that keyboard part in “Enchanted Villain” while making an impression of its own.

Branching out on side B is well in the wheelhouse for classic metal and heavy rock, but Danava are firm in their purposes throughout Nothing But Nothing, and whatever pace they’re keeping or elements are at play in the individual tracks, the progression across the album is natural and undeniable in the momentum they’re able to build going into the sweep that starts “Nuthin But Nuthin” and the moody finish that “Čas” — the title of which is ‘time’ in English according to a major tech company’s translation matrix — provides, rounding out a show-’em-how-it’s-done blueprint for bringing together different aspects of both styles from various eras preceding. An excellent and welcome return from an act who’ve earned their place as veterans.

If in hearing it one finds the spinning-in-circles madness of “Nothing But Nothing” or “Season of Vengeance,” the quicker parts of “Enchanted Villain,” etc., to be overwhelming, that would seem to be a big part of the point. It’s worth keeping in mind that wherever they go and however close they come to lightspeed in getting there, they’ve never out of control, not at all reckless, sloppy or haphazard, and if it’s landmarks you need to help keep up, they abound in choruses and riffs alike. Simply put, Danava — with Meleney as the founding principal — are masters of the form, and Nothing But Nothing is very much a thing in demonstrating that as furiously as it does. You might be sucking wind by the time they’re done, but that doesn’t mean you won’t also be ready to go around again.

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Tags: Danava, Danava Nothing But Nothing, Nothing But Nothing, Oregon, Portland, Tee Pee Records

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 6th, 2023 at 8:52 am and is filed under audiObelisk, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.