Let’s talk perfection. Let’s talk Danzig’s second album Lucifuge. Of its 11 tracks, an amazing 10 are pure perfection, and the remaining one track – Pain In The World – is “just” pretty damn awesome.
Regardless of what you think US musician Glenn Danzig’s peak moment in music is, you have to hand it to the man: his career from the late 70’s to the 90’s was pretty damn magical. First he helped define punk with Misfits, then he created one of the most esoteric rock acts of the time with Samhain, and for his third miracle he formed Danzig from the ashes of Samhain, and released a string of outstanding albums.
I know it’s a bit of a thing to laugh at Danzig these days, but damn it, with credentials like that, I guess you’ve earned the right to be a bit of an asshole. Right?
To me, Lucifuge is Danzig’s peak, bar none. This is the creme de la creme, the pick of the litter, the crown jewel.
I distinctly remember borrowing two Danzig albums from our local library – on vinyl! The two first Danzig albums. I loved Mother off of the debut, but for the most part, I just spun the second album. So much so, that eventually I had to rush out and spend what little money I had on a CD copy of it.
Lucifuge, like much of Danzig’s early albums under that name, are an amalgamation of many things. Obviously, there’s hard rock and heavy metal. But especially on Lucifuge, there’s equal amounts of blues. And, I proclaim, foreshadowings of all kinds of darker alternative rock of the 90’s. There’s a bit of 80’s rock bravado, albeit in a darker, more primal and less civilized form. There’s Jim Morrison, there’s Elvis Presley, and yeah, maybe there’s a bit of punk as well.
How to pick a favourite from an album this strong? An obvious choice is Snakes Of Christ with its killer riffs, thundering beat and Danzig’s haunting vocals – a true heavy blues rock anthem of the devil if there ever was one. But can it top the diabolic gothic romanticism of Her Black Wings? Or the sensual, sensitive and seductive ballad Devil’s Plaything?
All of these could be my favourite. As could album opener Long Way Back From Hell – a rousing, hard rockin’ opener that sets the stage perfectly.
But you know, maybe I’m going to go for the ultimate bad-assery of the blues piece Killer Wolf? Or even I’m The One, although that one lays on the blues clichés a bit too heavy over it’s acoustic, archetypal blues riffs. But Danzig manages to pull even that one off with flying colours.
Or should I award it to Girl, where Danzig obviously channels a bit of Jim Morrison in the lyrics but also the vocal performance.
Choices, choices!
I’ll leave the question of my favourite unanswered. They’re all my favourites. But the point is obvious: Lucifuge is a staggering album. Of iconic proportions, really. And not only because of its quality, but also because of how it tied together so many strains of contemporary rock music, and created a sort of nexus where what was converged, and again separated into what would be.
Certainly, Lucifuge’s dark, occult imagery feeds not only off Danzig’s personal interest in the esoteric, but also on the shock value in a world suffering from satanic panic. Musically, Lucifuge creates a place, where fans of artists as diverse as ZZ Top, Alannah Myles, Black Sabbath, Guns N’ Roses and what have you could (potentially) come together. Danzig with his band disassemble heavy metal and hard rock into their core components, and then piece it back together into an album that defines a moment in time.
And after: the rock swagger so perfectly embodied in its full dionysian, sinister splendor on Lucifuge would die. But Lucifuge takes it, crushes it, and blows to the world the seeds of dark, introspective, somber rock, and on the other hand a new, more sinister form of the masculine rock icon. Danzig may not have featured heavily on the record platters of the grunge and 90’s alternative rock generation, but beneath the Tony Iommi riffs of Pain In The World, Danzig captures that nihilistic, disenchanted spirit. And what of the legions of black clad gothic teens that would follow in the wake of Marilyn Manson and the likes just a few years later? Danzig’s lycanthrope finger points towards a path already here, at the dawn of the decade.
I admit, I wax poetical and superlative. But Lucifuge is a superlative album. And it’s one of those albums, which showed me the way as a kid. It was heavy metal enough to fit in with my musical diet, but it also sowed trepidative seeds that would blossom in a sincere love of blues a decade or so later. And I’m sure Blood And Tears plays a role in how I love a good pop tearjerker. And, of course, getting to know Danzig meant I eventually got to know Misfits – and therefore, got into punk.
And, of course, the occult, satanic lyrics and imagery played their own not-insignificant role in igniting my ongoing interest for everything esoteric.
Pictured in the top image is the CD copy I own, bought way back in the latter half of the 90’s. I never got around to getting a vinyl copy – for years, Danzig’s back catalogue was notoriously difficult to find on vinyl, and now, prices have become so outrageous I feel no pressing need to invest in a copy of Lucifuge on vinyl. This CD has served me well, and will continue to do so.
In From The Vaults we take a dive into the record collection at Only Death Is Real HQ and write about about items of iconic stature or personal significance; rarities and oddities from the archives; obscure gems that deserve more attention; classics of yore deserving of a moment in the limelight; and so on.
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