Dommin: Rise

Catchy goth’n’roll from the West Coast’s dark rockers

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Back in 2010, Dommin were tipped to be the next big thing in modern gothic rock.

Their first (proper) album, Love Is Gone, was released through Roadrunner and they even went on tour with Lacuna Coil and Rob Zombie, but a string of bad luck meant they never achieved the success they had worked so hard for.

Despite rumours of a new album, it seemed they had retreated to the shadows. Five years later, they’re back with the sequel to their catchy debut, packed with creepy keyboards, satisfying guitar solos and Kristofer Dommin’s super-smooth vocals. The spooky crunch of The Girls, in particular, is the perfect follow-up to their single, My Heart Your Hand. The four-piece prefer metaphorical demons and dark romance to cheesy horror puns, and the 10 tracks on here drip with Blessed Be-era 69 Eyes, The Damned’s goth-friendly Phantasmagoria and just a smidgen of Marilyn Manson. Although Dommin offer a lighter alternative to the dark delights of Grave Pleasures/Beastmilk and Kontinuum, their sound remains a haunting one, albeit with cobweb-dusting choruses.

Natasha Scharf
Natasha Scharf
Deputy Editor, Prog

Contributing to Prog since the very first issue, writer and broadcaster Natasha Scharf was the magazine’s News Editor before she took up her current role of Deputy Editor, and has interviewed some of the best-known acts in the progressive music world from ELP, Yes and Marillion to Nightwish, Dream Theater and TesseracT. Starting young, she set up her first music fanzine in the late 80s and became a regular contributor to local newspapers and magazines over the next decade. The 00s would see her running the dark music magazine, Meltdown, as well as contributing to Metal Hammer, Classic Rock, Terrorizer and Artrocker. Author of music subculture books The Art Of Gothic and Worldwide Gothic, she’s since written album sleeve notes for Cherry Red, and also co-wrote Tarja Turunen’s memoirs, Singing In My Blood. Beyond the written word, Natasha has spent several decades as a club DJ, spinning tunes at aftershow parties for Metallica, Motörhead and Nine Inch Nails. She’s currently the only member of the Prog team to have appeared on the magazine’s cover.