Red Moon BayonetsWhen Red Moon Bayonets released their debut EP last year, we at Goldenplec were suitably impressed. As such their follow up was always going to be highly anticipated, and the band’s second EP ‘The Dark West’ certainly lives up to the promise.

Once again Red Moon Bayonets have crafted a collection of edgy yet melodic tracks in the vein of their previous release, while still managing to take a few tentative steps in interesting new directions.

The EP opens with a short instrumental track The Dark, a neat little experiment with sludgy riffs that is reminiscent of Kyuss. This tone endures across the next two tracks, The Cure and Where She Lay. Both songs are positively dripping with darkness, evoking a strange and creepy edge with lyrics like “you’ve stolen my dreams, now I can’t sleep anymore.”

‘The Dark West’ is a very much a two part affair, with second short instrumental, West, denoting the beginning of the second half. This time the music draws on a more upbeat, surfer rock tone speeding up the pace without losing the melancholy strain that pervades throughout the entire EP. The final track By Design moves into Queens of the Stone Age territory with its mechanical riffs and airy, dreamy vocals.

If there is a flaw, it is the fact that the EP becomes a bit too aimless and free-flowing at times. Both of the instrumental interludes feel much more like the suggestion of a larger piece than actual songs. The longer tunes also suggest more than they actually achieve, and spend more time searching for something rather than finding anything that could be defined as a distinctive sound.

‘The Dark West’ is a collection that falls slowly upon the listener. It may spiral off it what sometimes seem like totally aimless directions, and, but there is still a core of tightly performed and catchy music that leaves us in as much anticipation of what this band will do next as we were before.