Danava are a hearty prog-rock soup of Hawkwind and Led Zeppelin with a big dollop of Cream stirred in for good measure. They produce stylised patterns with multiple tempo changes as synthesizers go head-to-head with muffled stoner guitars. Their insanely monikered vocalist, Dusty Sparkles, manages to shatter the slug-fest rising above the squabble with a soaring, echoing tenor. There’s even the occasional surprising burst of trumpet or cello which adds a welcome lift to a few of the tracks.It’s a shift from their debut album to a more complex sound. Sparkles credits this with an improved recording situation. “On our first album we felt really rushed, under the gun, to produce something great in time for release”, he explains. “With UnonoU things worked much more at the speed which we’re comfortable with.” Recorded in NYC studio facilities the group had plenty of time to experiment with new ideas and flesh out their songs.Listen to the theatrical doom of ‘Down From A Cloud, Up From The Ground’ and you’ll clearly find evidence of this more complex and complete sound. It starts off with the rise-and-fall of the vocal mirroring the guitar but soon slithers out into rattling cymbals and Moog warping patterns. The drums remain shapeless, punchy and stuttering whilst the vocal becomes darker, harder. The whole song lists from side to side as a vessel cast adrift on an ocean of battering sound-waves.It’s an album that blows hot and cold in both style and effectiveness. The better songs enable the listen to climb aboard with their warmer textures but others are impenetrable, overly-complicated, dumping their audience somewhere along the way. However hard the ride though it’s still a journey worth taking. 73%Links Danava [myspace]