Black Heart Procession - 6

San Diego's Black Heart Procession prefer the shadowy corners, as its name may suggest, but their sound skips over the industrial aggressiveness of black-clad goth entirely. Instead, their mood and lyrical moroseness centers on the religious metaphors and bleak self-destruction that haunts the works of Johnny Cash and Nick Cave. On 6, Black Heart Procession took their time creating these depressed vignettes, executing them simultaneously as they recorded a new Three Mile Pilot album, their legendary secondary outfit. Opening with "When You Finish Me", its Cave-like delivery and melancholy piano begins shuddering out of daylight as this album sinks into the roots of Americana gloom. "Heaven And Hell" stirs with an Wurlitzer gospel organ and somber marching line, as a perceived saviour is instead the punishing finisher, while "All My Steps" is a junkyard tango with its percussion instruments resembling clattering hubcap and oil barrel, as a Spanish guitar begins the affair. Black Heart Procession move exceptionally between the cheerless emotions of Leonard Cohen to the rickety dramatics of Tom Waits, showcasing the demons on their back.