Joey Danger: “Lust & Vulgarity” – a probing set of powerful emotional landscapes!

Joey Danger (Joseph Anthony Stuller) is a New York City based musician, film director, multimedia artist, and music producer. Joey has commercially released 3 EPs – “Fighting for Dynamics” (2006) “Alive” (2010) and his latest release, “Lust & Vulgarity” (2016). The air is brisk and the clouds are dark, casting day into night as the sky threatens to open up with a downpour of rain, or possibly even snow. Those are the type of images that run through my head as I listen to “Lust & Vulgarity” by this premier darkwave and trap crossover artist.

Joey Danger

With songs like “Stars” and “Surrender”, I won’t be surprised that many will choose to put this EP on the top of their play list during the winter. It sets the mood for standing up to a cruel season of icy temperatures that rarely shines its face of mercy. This is music to warm you from the inside and out.

Actually, the music here is very atmospheric and the resonating synths and powerful guitar flourishes add a depth of emotion to the haunting sounds that swirl like scorching teardrops falling from above, soaking the earth, around the transcendental crooning of Joey Danger.

I can respectfully say that Joey is probably the best thing to come out of this hybrid genre in recent years and I believe that hell will freeze over once he stops producing such ominous, yet beautiful, melodies that seem to linger, as if suspended in time, for they’re able to brew some of the most amazing ambient-industrial-trap soundscapes, and no one currently comes even remotely close to overriding his perfection.

Stately, commanding drum lines direct the highlights of your consciousness on “Faded”, while simple yet brooding bass parts punctuate and point to connections in the subconscious, and growling synths gently wrap together associations and memories into a neatly-woven mesh of mood and atmosphere. The contributions from Joey’s talk-sing vocals are remarkable here, as it gives presence and depth to the musical contrasts. It all works together beautifully.

The reverb and sound layering combined with the harmonies on “Girls” are so strong that if you relax, you’re in an endless field, blinded by the sunlight on the icy ground. Joey Danger creates an even more profound sense of circumstance on the title track “Lust & Vulgarity”, the darkest, thickest, and deepest track on the EP.

Joey’s music and voice provides a very consistent, honest and probing set of powerful emotional landscapes built on yearning, thoughtful, reflective music, in which the one-word titles may seem short at first glance, but are really utterly descriptive, once you fully listen to each track.

Joey Danger’s music has an incomparable quality of combining elements of the harsh and the soothing from life and love into a unified whole which is unutterably evocative, and has a tendency to really sink deep into your bones if you really let it. Five songs may seem on paper like too simple an effort, but it cannot be further from the truth.

Five tracks simply mean no filler, no fat and no excessive self-indulgence. “Lust & Vulgarity” is successful in rendering a sumptuous variety of tonality, rhythms and emotions leaving the listener wanting more. Joey Danger is a blessing to all of us who are smart enough to let music transport our hearts, souls and minds.