As YHWH Nailgun opens up, letting in worlds of analogue industrialism and minimalist experimentation, the band moves past its reputation as ‘the one with the drummer who really likes rototoms’.

Holy hyperbole, Batman! Fans and critics alike lauded debut album 45 Pounds for a plethora of reasons, including its mix of raw darkness and danceability. But I adore just how far the Philadelphia band’s ambitions are willing to travel, and that’s where album #2 comes in.

Magazine is a ‘sounds’ album, seldom without an idea – or sound – that is nifty or unsettling. Ghost of Love begins proceedings like a juxtaposed festival; Woodstock locked inside a coffin. The sound – a stubborn, anti-folk screech that simultaneously lurks and pounces – becomes the album’s signature in no time; it’s either a synth patch or the work of Saguiv Rosenstock’s crazed pedalboard.

Several songs run on a specific soundbite to complement its ominous atmosphere; Stillness Blues’ industrialised crow’s caw; Give Blood’s toms, which sound like they’re falling up the stairs; To the Devil’s uncomfortably shimmering keys.

Few modern bands take umbrage with borrowing from the late ‘70s or ‘80s, but YHWH Nailgun do it a little differently, by scruffing up old school gothic doom and gloom and introducing it to these larger, reverbing dark rooms of theirs. The ‘80s gothic desolation of Sewer Tree thrives on this individualistic moxie, overcoming even the shortages of its blindly poetic lyrics (a common concern).

(Continuing the last thought and mentioning Ghost of Love again, the song contains the only lyric that overcomes the album’s ‘bunch of words’ approach with something that is actually imagistic: “my love has a thousand eyes” – but what can I say? I’m weird and I love that they got weird).

I’ve heard Nick Cave is a fan – surprise, surprise, he enjoys finding beauty in bleakness. The Bad Seeds’ earlier palettes were often quite open – room for a piano to twonk away whilst drums collapse like waves and Cave howls like a deranged grump – but those of Magazine are even more open whilst remaining Cave-esque…

In its minimalism, Burns prowls and panics like ‘80s Cave, whilst each instrument of Hips on a Wheel sounds proudly adlibbed in its individual pocket. Ballerina, a moment of factual togetherness, contrasts by appearing focussed from the get-go; possessed riff-like chords struck from Ghost of Love’s signature sound; acute drum patterns that manage to slot in. You may consider it joyous.

I suppose Magazine is joyous in general, particularly to us madmen who see the uplifting side in music the man on the street might find too negative. There is never a despondency to it; full of guts and feeling; full of eclectic abrasiveness, and eclectic darkness.

Best tracks – Ghost of Love – Ballerina.

Rating – 7 out of 10