Could I be anymore lost? Yes, I'm lost because, after at least 20 listens to Dainami's "The Process", I still couldn't find a good way to classify them. Is it heavy? Mellow? Soothing? Dark? Emotional? Aggressive?
Well, it's all of the above. Let me put it this way; if a mediocre rapcore band were a triangle, Costa Mesa's Dainami would be an icosahedron. Their music touches upon everything, from the darkness and depression of The Cure, to the audacity of Tool passing through the psychedelic overtones and rage of Jane's Addiction to the artistry of dredg and the melody of Radiohead. Altogether, such music is easy to get deeply lost in, much like being stuck in a forest at night without a flashlight.
Their music is full of subtleties that you might not catch if listened to while not paying close attention. In fact, "The Process" isn't an easily digestible album, and will certainly require multiple listens before it starts growing on the listener. Sometimes devastating, while at others ripe with depressively melodic guitar work and mechanical precision tempo shifts, the band latch challenging sounds onto crazy and, in a sense, almost tribal drum beats, pushing the envelope for a 3-piece band in nearly unbelievable directions.
"The Process" is definitely a must have when considering that the music presented here runs outside the mainstream cliche and instead tries to bring something new and unheard of to the masses; yet for now, it should be viewed more as a work in progress rather than a full and complete representation. A few elements of Dainami's music should and certainly will be improved with time, such as the vocals. Even though they sound frighteningly driven by the music and emotional lyrics, they do still feel a little bit raw. A few of the songs here also end up eventually boring the listener, usually due to unnecessary repetition of the same verses, or uninspiring melodies that are unsuccessfully try to sound depressive.
Still, when balancing the aspects shown on this debut album, the upsides far outweigh the downsides. With songs such as "Speaking Slowly" (by far the album's best tune), "The Argument of Universal Sterilization" and "Drive", Dainami prove that they're trying to bring to people something new and unusual; and with that, this debut album of theirs is more like a painting or a book rather than just another album for people to find on the shelves of their local Best Buy's or Tower's. "The Process" is a catalyst of three people's emotions, a kind of musical frame that exposes, in a concrete way, all of their feelings, just as a painting does for a painter or a poem does for a poet.
The honesty in their music is so prevalent that it can almost be touched, and that's what makes this album so special to anyone who owns it. Definitely a gigantic first step through the long process that is the finding of a label as a home.
