The Ritualists transport you to a world surging with dark waves both dramatic and familiar.

Photo by Sam Keeler

The Ritualists mixes early Cult with early Suede. At least that's what I'm hearing in the first couple of seconds I started testing out. On their new album Painted People, out August 2, the band sounds like an industrial kitchen mixer of glam, hard rock, and melodramatic pop influences. Listen to the album's first single "Ice Flower" below and tell me I'm wrong.

But that's lazy of me, no? The honest fact is that this album appeared in my inbox just this afternoon, and as usual I started to play a few seconds of a few songs in order to properly label it for eventual upload to Ye Olde tankPHONE once I got home this evening.* Only a funny thing happened, and I found that instead of hitting fast forward or "NEXT!" I settled in and listened to the whole thing right away.

Why did this happen? It's not because the album is amazingly groundbreaking or anything like that. I think it had more to do with how alien it sounded. I mean, the tropes are familiar, but its been so long since I've heard much of a band's machinations that could easily feel arch come off as sincere. Perhaps that's the band's talent? For all I know, front-person Christian Dryden and his very band of musicians could be total scene poseurs. If that's the case, they know their scene better than any faker, and come awfully close to sounding sincere. So if it's a pose, it's an incredibly well struck one.

In the band's latest press release Dryden speaks of "being inspired by larger-than-life characters such as David Bowie, Simon Le Bon, Bryan Ferry and Marc Bolan" and Painted People certainly channels that inspiration proudly and openly.** The Ritualists takes these touchstones and cast them into a crystalline pond, subsequently skimming its surface for a collection of glistening songs that actually feel like the band means what they're saying. Whether that's true or not doesn't really matter though—this is an unexpected pleasure straight out of left field that I'm glad I neglected to hit pause upon and instead swallowed whole.



*For the unfamiliar, when I get music during the day I prep it to transfer to tankPHONE in an "albums to review" playlist each evening. I figure out the genre and standardize how the music displays as well as ensuring every album has the correct cover. Nerd stuff.

**There are a TON more influences as well, but I've already relied too heavily on "sounds like" terminology, so listen up and figure out your own connections to the rest.