New Yorker and singer-songwriter Lana Blac has been honing her musical craft for the past few years and has just unleashed her powerful and passionate debut album Nocturnal last week via Cataclysm Records. Blac has built up a solid presence on social media and her bold sound and attitude is influenced by big artists and acts like Evanscence, Maddona, Marilyn Manson, and Rob Zombie.
The flames rise high on LP-opener “Suck You In” with its stabbing guitar jabs, bludgeoning drum beat, piercing strings, and Blac’s threatening vocal attack as she growls, “Maybe you’re heaven / Maybe you’re hell / Which one am I?”. “Pick Your Poison” keeps up the dark atmosphere, but smoothes it out instrumentally while Blac bitterly reveals, “I want nothing more for you / than to feel pain.”
Lust, betrayal, revenge, and independence are prominent themes that rise from the ashes as Blac stalks and propels her way through Nocturnal. A rocky, ruinous, but ravishing relationship is the focus of “Recipe for Disaster”. “The Game” is a sexy, but strong MF, while the spellbinding vibe of “In The Darkness” is a perfect track for Halloween.
“Blac Ice” chills and thrills with monster movie organ notes, baroque harpsichord runs, and sinuous guitar motifs. The shivery instrumentation is an uneasy bed for Blac’s winding vocals to lie in, as she builds to a vocal crescendo that’s full of regret. She’s looking back at a past relationship that’s broken beyond repair, ruefully sighing, “You will crash and burn / for what you did behind my back / Deceit – I’ll show you how it feels…”
The reflective “Soul Stalker” amps up the alt-rock with supple, but lurching guitar and bass lines, subdued drum beats, and simmering cymbals strikes. The song splits into a different personality midway through with shouted vocals and more lumbering pace.
Closer “Crave” sweeps by with more romantic (and maybe morbid?) sentiments as Blac sings bittersweetly about her love, “I know… that nothing will ever last / I want to hold your hand / from now to the grave / I want you, I love you / It’s you that I crave.”
