by
The Darkness
- Record Label: Atlantic
- Release Date: Nov 29, 2005
- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
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Alternative PressThe best Def Leppard album "Mutt" Lange never wrote. [Feb 2006, p.126]
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Spin[A] more toned-down, at times strikingly sincere, follow-up. [Dec 2005, p.104]
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It may surprise you, but 'One Way Ticket To Hell... And Back' doesn't suck... at all.
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Even the best jokes don't bear repeated listening. A great song, however, is worth hearing over and over again. One Way Ticket... has both, but there's more of the latter than the former.
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Q MagazineThe same album, only more so. [Dec 2005, p.146]
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Unabashedly grand, deliriously enjoyable.
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BlenderBaker... somehow makes them sound more outrageous--and more convincing. [Dec 2005, p.148]
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As long as they can create songs that dance on the razor's edge between clever and stupid, there will always be a place for The Darkness.
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So what if the Darkness are nothing but a bunch of playacting nancy boys. They have an outstanding penchant for hooks [and] write witty and possibly sometimes moving lyrics.
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I defy you not to enjoy this album.
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MojoThey're a group that believes in a thing called love. Happily, however, they don't believe in a thing called restraint. [Dec 2005, p.98]
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The majority of the tricks, however, come off as cosmetic distractions, attempts to hide that Hawkins' songwriting hasn't grown since Permission to Land.
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Not so much a letdown as a comedown, One Way Ticket to Hell...and Back just shows that the giddy highs of Permission to Land aren't so easy to get the second time around.
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One Way Ticket to Hell . . . and Back is a classic case of a hot band with a hit debut -- 2003's Permission to Land -- running headlong into the sophomore jinx.
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UncutThis is fizzy, superficial pop by a band convinced they're making classic rock. [Dec 2005, p.114]
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One Way Ticket To Hell...And Back is a sturdy rock album with some saucy titles and odd instruments, but sadly it is less than it could or should be.
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The New York TimesThe riffs aren't as well built as the first album's, nor are the songs' conceits. Still, the album's not a disaster. [28 Nov 2005]
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Stripped of novelty and goodwill, The Darkness are just a resolutely ordinary band after all.
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Los Angeles TimesThe challenge in coming back for Round 2 was to make it more than a one-note joke, but the Darkness remains in its Spinal Tap mode for most of "One Way Ticket." [6 Dec 2005]
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New Musical Express (NME)This perpetual desire to show off is Hawkins' weakness and 'One Way Ticket..."s ultimate downfall. [26 Nov 2005, p.44]
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One Way Ticket to Hell's blandness seems like the perfect example of the difficulties of riding a revivalist routine longer than necessary.
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Entertainment WeeklyWithout any real scream-along, kick-ass songs, this is just a One Way Ticket to Hell. Period. [2 Dec 2005, p.81]
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The weird thing is, without Hawkin's ridiculous vocals, most of these songs would have been sure-fire hits, if only they'd been released twenty years ago.
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So the mission statement of this CD is clear; this is a product made by the emotionally and culturally sterile for people who either have no conception of love, depression, or any other emotional state outside of pop culture cliché, or those so desperate for entertainment that they would deceive themselves into thinking the feckless chicanery of this masturbatory ensemble resembles soulful expression in any way.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 44 out of 57
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Mixed: 2 out of 57
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Negative: 11 out of 57
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Feb 5, 2023
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Aug 15, 2015
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May 20, 2013