The Jersey-based horror-punk icon's first album in five years,
Skeletons is best summed up by the man himself: "If you took
Elvis and
Sabbath out of my life, I would probably not be the
Glenn Danzig you know." Comprising ten covers and sounding a bit like a raucous open-mike-night takeover (seriously, if
Glenn Danzig sauntered into your local watering hole on amateurs night and handed the house band a set list, you would definitely stick around),
Skeletons is a delight for longtime fans, especially those who lean harder toward the
Misfits/Samhain end of the spectrum. Raw, rowdy, and devoid of any sort of studio chicanery,
Skeletons feels less like a proper
Danzig album and more like a home recording of a boozy late-night house show. Surprisingly, its slapdash, lo-fi demeanor mostly works in its favor. Opener "Devil's Angels," the theme song from the 1967 biker-sploitation film of the same name, bristles with melody-driven,
Legacy of Brutality-era
Misfits swagger, as does the pulpy "Action Woman" and "With a Girl Like You," the former a sugary take on the 1967 psych-rock nugget from
the Litter and the latter a spirited, fidelity-deficient distillation of the 1966
Troggs hit. A lumbering, stoner metal re-imagining of
Sabbath's "NIB" and a ballsy, muscled-up rendering of
Presley's "Let Yourself Go" impress as well, but some of the slower numbers like "Find Somebody" (
the Rascals) and "Crying in the Rain" (
the Everly Brothers) are weighed down by vocal takes that sound like they were laid down after a ten-mile run. Lemons aside,
Skeletons never pretends to be anything other than a vanity project (note the
David Bowie Pin Ups-inspired cover photo), and it's certainly a hell of a lot more fun that 2010's brooding and shiftless Deth Red Sabaoth. By getting back to his roots,
Danzig seems to have found a bit of the spark that made him such a formidable frontman in the '80s and '90s. Here's to hoping he channels a bit of that old hook-filled ultraviolence into future endeavors. Also, maybe hire a producer. ~ James Christopher Monger