Album Review: The Afghan Whigs- Do to The Beast

Here’s the thing with this new Afghan Whigs LP. I’ve been sitting this with for a while, trying to let it “grow” on me—as you may be aware, some albums don’t speak to you right away, they must grow on you over time. And now here we are, over a month later, and we have reached the official release date of what is being dubbed the band’s first album in sixteen years, and their return to Sub Pop, Do to The Beast.

I got to the party very, very late on the Whigs, and I discovered them via Greg Dulli’s first post-Whigs side project, The Twilight Singers—specifically their genre bending debut, Twilight as Played by The Twilight Singers. The trip-hop meets coffee house vibes on Twilight proved to be a true one-off experiment, as The Twilight Singers output over the last decade plus have been relatively straightforward rock records.

Basically what I’m getting at is that whatever the project that Dulli is associated with, it has that “Greg Dulli sound.” That sound means very big, bombastic, cinematic, and emotional moments. But it also means a specific production quality, as well as standard instrumentation. So whether it be The Twilight Singers, his one-time collaboration with Mark Lanegan as The Gutter Twins, or now reunited with the Whigs—it’s a Greg Dulli record.

I should say that this “reunion” is a bit of a loose concept—save for the original bassist—it’s primarily Dulli’s stable of frequent contributors from recent incarnations of The Twilight Singers.

So that brings us to this album—Do to The Beast—with its awkward, slightly cumbersome title, and somewhat unfortunate cover art. Overall, it’s not so much that it’s a bad record or that it is damaging the legacy of The Afghan Whigs, but when compared to the lustful R&B leanings of their swan song, 1965, as well as the most recent Twilight Singers LP, 2011’s Dynamite Steps, it’s really lacking, and at times it just feels a tad phoned in.

I think maybe what left a sour taste in my mouth right out of the gate was the very tepid first single, “Algiers,” a song that unfortunately boasts some spaghetti western vibes, and just kind of doesn’t go anywhere.

Do to The Beast opens with a big, brash statement—but it’s a familiar sounding statement. The drumming on “Parked Outside” is nearly identical to The Gutter Twins “All Misery,” but with just a slightly different production technique applied to it. “Parked Outside” seems like it’s the kind of opening track that wants to go somewhere—like it wants to build towards something—but it just doesn’t make it there before it ends.

At no point on Do to The Beast does Dulli and company reach the cocky swagger and debauched R&B sleaze that The Afghan Whigs were primarily known for. That’s not to say that they don’t try—early on in the record, “Matamoros” slithers along with the help of some heavy synth blasts. It’s one of many on the record that seem to rely heavily on the power coming from the refrain of the song, hoping that can carry it through the tepid and uninspired verses.

The high point, for me anyway, on Do to The Beast arrives with “The Lottery.” Dulli aims for the rafters with the epic heights that it scales—heavily delayed and panned guitar theatrics assist in powering it, and it is one of the few moments where the desperation in Dulli’s world-wearied, sometimes ragged voice seems appropriate, and more importantly, believable.

One neat trick in the final third of the record involves the segue between “Royal Cream” and “I am Fire.” It’s very reminiscent of the way the Whigs closed out their breakthrough record from 1993—Gentlemen, and it creates one of the few creative moments on the album.

Do to The Beast closes up with a “big” closing track in the form of “These Sticks,” complete with a brass section. Dulli is known for writing epic finales—Dynamite Steps’ title track was a true emotional rollercoaster, and with The Whigs, the band’s 1996 LP Black Love, contains probably one of the best final songs I’ve ever heard—“Faded.” And I mean if you don’t feel something at the end of that, then I question how you are living your life. Anyway, “These Sticks” is the kind of wrap up that seems void of the real emotional punch it wants to pull. It’s grandiose sounding just for that very sake, and much like the rest of the record, isn’t really connecting, or saying much.

As uninteresting and borderline forgettable as Do to The Beast ends up being in the end, it’s far from being unlistenable. It comes off less an Afghan Whigs album, and more like a Twilight Singers b-sides collection. There’s a real lack of cohesion, and without anything connecting the pieces, it just kind of seems like 10 songs tossed together. Longtime fans of Greg Dulli in any incarnation may appreciate his return to the Afghan Whigs moniker, but overall, it—like many albums released this year—simply exists, and it’s something that I will probably not return to much in 2014.

Do to The Beast arrives Tuesday via Sub Pop.