…featuring the original album, B-sides, remixes, singles and never-before-released live at NEC, Birmingham, which has been newly mixed by Dan Hawkins.
From the moment the pan flute fanfare on “One Way Ticket” kicks off One Way Ticket to Hell…and Back, it’s clear that the Darkness still believes that more is more. If anything, the band believes that even more is even better: with the help of producer Roy Thomas Baker, they make their second album incredibly glossy and expensive-sounding, with layers of sitars, marching drums, bagpipes, and tubular bells on top of their already-powerful guitars, drums, and keyboards (and, of course, Justin Hawkins’ formidable falsetto). But while the band’s excess succeeded on…