Double Virgo
Shakedown
YEAR0001
Jul 28, 2025
Net Unique
Oh, indie sleaze—Y2K’s snotty little sibling. In the event you might seek for a definition of it, you may discover Double Virgo, the London duo of Sam Fenton and Jezmi Tarik Fehmi, and their group with Nina Cristante (aka NINA), bar italia, mid-way by way of its musical subheading. The air that hangs round each teams reeks of “too cool for varsity,” a label that doesn’t come off negatively if you happen to can again it up with envelope-pushing music. Double Virgo’s new album Shakedown sadly digs into the dregs of the development and by no means actually surfaces.
Lacking Cristante, Shakedown is a two headed Cerberus—rather less formidable and unable to assault from as many angles because it ought to. Songs lie stagnantly monotone and the alluringly languid guitar and vocals that Nina delivered to the desk are noticeably absent.
Vocals on tracks like “coi boi” and “purple card” whine and croon their manner over worn out chords in her stead, and the acoustic guitar and cheery Oh-wa-ah-ohs of “bemused” are paying homage to a cool child’s tackle Fitz & The Tantrums.
Lyrics are tough to achieve by way of their supply, and if you do they greet you obnoxiously—“You give nice head/You’re actually good in mattress/Your breath’s so candy/I do know you’re actually neat” they record off in “Function Play.”
The place this recipe does form of shine is when Double Virgo diversifies its components. The finely chopped guitar on “due dilettante” gives some nuance, and when the band provides the components up altogether for the acoustic monitor “only for a buzz up,” drugged out vocals are joined by backing harmonies that lower off simply earlier than it builds into the album’s normal banality.
Whereas Double Virgo’s popularity as NINA adjacents gives immunity, it’s exhausting to not see Shakedown as one thing that instantly challenges its integrity. Vocals and lyrics drag this one away into the slacker rock ether, one other stone within the pedestal for its champions to sit down upon. If sleaze is to “behave in an immoral, corrupt, or sordid manner,” Double Virgo has given it its dingy theme that you just may wish to maintain your drink away from. (www.doublevirgo.bandcamp.com)
Writer score: 3/10
Fee this album
Common reader score: 2/10