Tatyana Kunda is a fan from Latvia, who has been a regular TD internet presence for a good few years now.
I do have a strange thing about discovering and liking new music. I somehow ‘manage’ to really get into a band/group/whatever when they cease to exist. It happens to me all the time and this was exactly what happened to my ‘The Darkness’ experience. Unfortunately, I did not really have the chance to see them in their initial full glory.
2003 was the year when I heard ‘The Darkness’ for the first time on VH1 or MTV. It was the voice that most definitely caught my attention. As a huge ‘Queen’ fan I could not help but have this ‘Wait a minute!’ moment when hearing the opening lines. Can’t explain all the feeling that you’re making me feel, indeed. Alas, at that point I was too careless/foolish/insert your own word not to find out more about the band. ‘The Darkness’ remained relatively unknown in my country, though, contrary to one interview, have never been hated (http://youtu.be/siee6ZV57s0?t=1m22s). That’s the sad part of my story as I lost a couple of years of the listening pleasure. The fun part began some years later (after the group had actually disbanded). While looking for some new stuff to listen to, I remembered about a certain group called ‘The Darkness’. Hoping there would be at least 3 new albums, I , to my horror, found out that the lead singer had left the group. The rest is a series of happy coincidences – coming across Mr Hawkin’s Myspace page, meeting a lot of wonderful people and, of course, enjoying the MUSIC! Thus, I got the album much later than a proper fan should have done it.
I can’t say I enjoyed every track on the album at once, but that’s the usual course of things, I suppose. The obvious favourites have always been ‘I Believe in a Thing Called Love’, ‘Love is Only a Feeling’, ‘Growing on Me’, ‘Stuck in a Rut’. Come to think of it, I’ll have to mention every song on the album, as each of them became a favourite at a certain moment. That’s actually the best thing about ‘The Darkness’, you can’t stop liking them in any kind of mood or life situation. Be it ‘Love is Only a Feeling’ for a more romantic mood or ‘Friday Night’ for a more playful one, or ‘Black Shuck’ when being under pressure. And another tricky thing about ‘The Darkness’- you can never be sure what the song is actually about. That kinda makes choosing a ‘personal anthem’ difficult but adds to the fun. Don’t get me wrong, the music is not a joke. However, this ‘do not take life too seriously, you will never get out of it alive’ attitude wasn’t hard to notice. At the same time, they managed to be the most positive band out there. Even having the darkest name.
The Darkness did change my life in a way, or even in a couple of ways. Musically? Of course! They were and still are a kind of breath of fresh air in the industry of ‘manufactured miracles’. Most importantly, they managed to create a community that has been with them at their highest and their lowest; and this adds even more value to their music. Has my attitude changed over the years? It would be wrong to assume the contrary. The blind fandom has been replaced by a more sensible (though not less positive) approach to music and everything that surrounds it. However, I am grateful for all the experience I’ve had. There surely is life after the darkness but why choose it if there are (hopefully) many more years of good music to come.