The Dead and Living – Damage (EP)

Released by: Rexius Records

Release Date: 28.02.25

Running Time: 17:35

Score: 8/10

Hello, everyone. I am writing this while I have a pizza in the oven, and I am lamenting Mrs Dark Juan having left me unsupervised at home. However, there are upsides, one being that the postman has brought me my long awaited and extremely difficult to acquire F-102 Delta Dagger model kit, which means that my Century Series fighter aircraft collection is complete and now I actually have to build the fuckers. Which also leads to one of Dark Juan’s most hated tasks, being DIY, because I am fucking shit at it. I need more shelf space to display what I have made. I built a set of bookshelves from scratch about a year ago and I am frankly shocked that it is still doing what it is supposed to and hasn’t collapsed into a massive pile of recycled wood and the many thousands of books that Mrs Dark Juan and I possess. Which I still haven’t sorted out yet into their respective categories. Although the Mile Vorkosigan Saga is in chronological order…

I have just finished reviewing some Welsh Metal from Lifer, and I have decided to completely change gear and review a four-track EP I have been sitting on for a while because life rather irritatingly keeps getting in the bloody way of a bit of enjoyment, so I hereby present to you Swedish Gothic Rockers/ Post-Punkers The Dead and Living. This band have not released music since 2019, so it is with some excitement that I reverently remove the esteemed and puissant Platter of Splatter ™ from its chambers and place this latest Swedish offering upon it.

It’s a bit different from what I know of The Dead and Living, being as they have been existing in a kind of sideways-skewed 19th Century decadence for the past decade or so, and this EP drags them screamingly into futurism. As vocalist Coroner himself says,

“With this release, we wanted to bring the band and its essence into the contemporary. The sort of space-themed EP makes a lot more sense now than we initially thought it would. The infinite dimensions of space and its vast darkness that has always been there and always will be. It’s not so much a science fiction theme as a modern take on this insane cosmic thing we’re all part of.

One late night, I saw a film called 'A Journey to the End of Time' by Melodysheep on YouTube. The ending quote, leaves you in a lingering state of mind: 'At the end of the universe, nothing happens, and it keeps not happening, forever.' Out of that mental state, the new material started taking shape.”

Quite. It’s not often that a band concerns itself with the entropic heat death of the universe.  However, we shall press on in blatant disregard of the fact that one day even death will die, and time will go with it, because I am a bit hung over and that kind of contemplation is frankly beyond me at the moment. Too much fine single malt last night, you see.

The EP opens with ‘Damage’ and it is a stonking statement of intent from these morose Swedes. An expansive and atmospheric track with touches of Industrial creeping into the seductive Gothicness of it, Coroner crooning in his baritone over female vocals and slow burning, affective music that doesn’t bludgeon as much as it curls itself sinuously around you, kissing your neck before slipping a diamond-sharp stiletto between your ribs and watching you lose blood with every heartbeat, a cruel sneer upon its face, overlaid with perverse joy that it has taken another life. It is sheer Gothic magnificence – massively overblown and powerful and I fucking LOVE it to death already. There are goosebumps all over my body as the chorus builds and the backing vocals slam straight into the pleasure centres of my brain and squeeze out every last drop of endorphins…

The next song is called ‘Magma Heart’ and with a title like that it really should be a Synthwave number, but instead we have another slab of Gothic beauty, but beauty with an edge. An exquisitely coiffed, impossibly beautiful lady vampire, gorgeously attired and elegant and sophisticated approaching a rough-hewn working man, whispering blandishments and blasphemies in his ear and promising nothing but ecstasy and pleasure if he would just come home with her. The backing vocals are again the highlight of this track as well as a Black Metal tinged central guitar riff that razors its way around the edges of your arteries, promising death but delighting in the fact that the victim is quivering and shivering in fear, their flesh gone cold because of their terror, quailing as they try to look down to see the sliver of dangerous, edged metal caressing their throat.

‘Demons Till I’m Dead’ is the third song and again the female backing vocals are doing something to Dark Juan and his pleasure centres. Seriously, they are gonna be as dry as a nun’s crotch after this EP. The band take a more Gothic approach to the song although the bridge is a percussive masterpiece as it builds back to an anthemic chorus. All swooping keyboards and insouciant sexiness, this song is rather more seductive than the first two offerings, and that offers a bit of light and shade instead of overpowering Gothic overload.

The final song on this EP is ‘Army of Mankind’ and this closes out the record with an Industrial Goth masterclass. Coroner is well able to dissolve the panties off a room full of Goth girls in ridiculous boots in short order with his vocals, and the backing vocals having a choral quality overlaying some quality riffage makes it a fine way to finish the record and leaves this sad old goff wanting a lot more.

This is a cracking little EP chock full of stuff that the Goths and the Post-Punkers should be falling over themselves to get hold of, with interesting little admixtures of Industrial and choral music. Dark Juan is now waiting for the next full release from The Dead and Living with bated and rather excited breath.

The Patented Dark Juan Blood Splat Rating System (Det patenterade Dark Juan-systemet för blodstänk, för alla svenska vänner jag kanske inte känner till, förutom Steffis pojkvän Simon, ber jag om ursäkt om detta är fel men jag kan absolut ingen svenska men jag har en tradition av att skriva något på språket i band jag lyssnar på... Så skyll inte på mig, skyll på Google Translate...) awards The Dead and Living 8/10 for a brilliant EP. Marks have been deducted because a) I am a big fat meanie and b) I want a fucking album!

TRACKLISTING:

Damage

Magma Heart

Demons Till I’m Dead

Army of Mankind

LINE-UP:

I’m going to be very transparent here – I have struggled to find any details of the band members online, which means that I would make a fucking awful detective. However, I know that Coroner is the vocalist, Gravedigger the bassist and at least one guitarist is called Lord. The drummer might be called Vincent and there was a guitarist called Janitor. Which made Mrs Dark Juan laugh and wonder if that name was inspired by Scooby Doo.

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