Night Club – Scary World

Night Club - Scary World

Album facts

Release: August 24th, 2018
Label: Self-release
Genre: , ,
Discogs: No link yet

Caught between creepshow and reality

Night Club's second record 'Scary World' sends you right into the haunted house of life – with pock­ets full of elec­tron­ic ear­candy drag­ging you to the ground. I already loved 'Requiem For Romance' dat­ing back in 2016 and they've def­in­itely out­shone their debut album with this new shot.

But let's get down to it – show your tick­et and off we go!

Follow the brumous path down the moonlit, grassy hill

'Beware!' is a soft but way creepy open­er to this very spe­cial world of elec­tron­ic sweet­ness and super real­ist­ic truth in mat­ters of lyr­ics, end­ing with a chil­drens' choir push­ing you into the yawn­ing black door of 'Scary World'.

Hitting you hard in the face the song sets off with a dirty fat beat, con­tras­ted by Emily Kavanaugh's lovely girlie voice.

They only love you if you fol­low. […] They only love you when you act so hollow
Lyrics from 'Scary World' by Night Club

Being a uni­ver­sal truth to most of us, this chor­us is def­in­itely scary in con­tent as well as arrange­ment: the chil­drens' choir back­ing Emily's vocals does quite a thing to it as well as the haunted melody. Nevertheless you notice your­self singing hap­pily along with it and enjoy­ing the bridge build­ing up ten­sion. It unloads itself with a partyable vol­ley of 'HeyHeyHeys' but leav­ing you some­what vul­ner­able in the hall­way with the chil­drens' choir echo­ing off in the dark.

No rest for the wicked

'Schizophrenic' shakes you pretty well just as the con­di­tion would. The tear­ing beats and the melody resem­bel­ing a bump­er car soundtrack are a per­fect fit for this rela­tion­ship themed song. It pushes and pulls you and makes you feel this seeth­ing dis­or­i­ent­a­tion of an emo­tion­ally mis­lead state of mind.

Slowing down to heart­beat rate 'Your Addiction' brings you down to your feet again. Not that you might have a second to breathe – the bass punches you right into the stom­ach for­cing you down on your knees:

I am your church these are your sins […] don't you wish you could take 'em back now
Lyrics from 'Your Addiction' by Night Club

The per­man­ent up-and-down-pulling of sound and the del­ic­ate, sec­ond­ary melod­ies rep­res­ent per­fectly what it feels like to enjoy and endure an imbal­anced realationship.

Night Club - Press photo 2018
Night Club – Press photo 2018

With a whip lash 'Blood On Your Blade' crashes into your back and kicks you off bal­ance with its beat. The almost blues-like vocal repi­ti­tion sends you down a music­al spir­al accom­pan­ied by a fall­ing melody. The arrange­ment is exquis­itely chosen for fall­ing and loos­ing are integ­ral parts of the lyrics.

Giving in to panic

'Candy Coated Suicide' was the first song of the album spawn­ing to life as a music video. Following Night Club's visu­al path of 'Spooky Alice' the video is just as oppu­lent and full of bril­liant iron­ic ideas as the song itself. Yes, I do love the white Keyboard Rabbits!
Changes of speed, the con­tra­dic­tion between the main vocals and the under­ly­ing male dis­tor­ted vocal line which can be found through­out the whole album make this com­pos­i­tion spe­cial. The Adam's Family fin­ger click­ing is the cherry on top of this big heap of deadly candy cot­ton.

Kill me with your sug­ar rush […] tell me why I still want you to be mine, you're a pois­on in my mind
Lyrics from 'Candy Coated Suicide' by Night Club

Taking flight from the world's expect­a­tions is the motive in 'Therapy (Get High)'. Whereas the strophes keep low, forelorn and a hint depressed, the chor­us lifts itself up, up and away. It feels quite eer­ie to find your­self lilt­ing along with lyr­ics like

High, High, High, that's where I want to be – High, High, High, no more anxiety
Lyrics from 'Therapy (Get High)' by Night Club

prob­ably while wash­ing the dishes. But that's the scary world we live in.

Flight is an option

'Imaginary Friend' drops you straight into a lonely Nintendo Adventure. 8Bit romantic gets accom­pan­ied by full, spher­ic 80ies key­boards to cre­ate a world quite agree­able to exchange with the real, false world out­side where this non-romantic, nearly aut­ist­ic epis­ode happens.

Come on and lie to me, lie to me, tell me that you would die for me, die for me – so will you stay with me and we can play pre­tend so you could be my next ima­gin­ary friend.
Lyrics from 'Imaginary Friend' by Night Club

If none of the ear­worms before stuck with you – this will. I kept singing the chor­us for I guess three days non stop.

Michael Jackson in SloMo. 'Vampires' caught me exactly there. I instantly thought of 'Thriller', only more intense, fresh­er, closer. A feel­ing of being sucked at bil­lows out of every note. The ghostly pan flute gives you grave­yard shivers although you know, you won't get away this time. Still, the song lacks a peak or a con­clu­sion which I per­son­ally would have enjoyed here a lot.

The light at the end of the tunnel is a train

'Survive' hits vir­tu­ally the ground run­ning, or so it sounds. Soft vocals cov­er the torn piano melody mistily and BAM – the club crashes your jaw!

The big wave of siren, alarm, beat and force rushes over you, sur­prises you, car­ries you away. The fol­low­ing bridge is the sweetest piano-Emily-sym­bi­os­is you might ima­gine, build­ing up ten­sion, high­er and high­er, know­ing, there must be an end to this ever upward aggres­sion which thun­ders down in a heavy, straight beat, giv­ing the record a very intense finale.

Come on, let's do the Haunted House again!

That was fun. I already told you, I simply love this album. Compared to their first record, the band's artist­ic­al path is much clear­er without los­ing vari­ety. Night Club has an unmis­tak­able style which they con­tinu­ally evolve. If that's your cup of tea, you're abso­lutely right here at the Mad Hatters Tea Time! And now: run for 'Scary World'!

By the way, this album also made it into our art­icle ‘The best Synth Pop and genre-related albums 2018‘. Read now.

Track By Track Rating

Night Club - Scary World
Night Club – Scary World
Beware!
Scary World
Schizophrenic
Your Addiction
Blood On Your Blade
Candy Coated Suicide
Therapy (Get High)
Imaginary Friend
Vampires
Survive
Recommend
Scary World
Candy Coated Suicide
Therapy (Get High)
Imaginary Friend
Weak
(Nothing to report here)
4.2
Earcandy

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  1. 4.1
    Most power­ful album in 2018

    'Scary World' is filled with bom­bast­ic beats and catchy tunes. I instantly fell in love with this blast­ing album. Powerful dynam­ic music is the new ref­er­ence here! 

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    Beware!
    Scary World
    Schizophrenic
    Your Addiction
    Blood On Your Blade
    Candy Coated Suicide
    Therapy (Get High)
    Imaginary Friend
    Vampires
    Survive
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Beware!
Scary World
Schizophrenic
Your Addiction
Blood On Your Blade
Candy Coated Suicide
Therapy (Get High)
Imaginary Friend
Vampires
Survive
Final Score