"Passing Shades" by Group Rhoda

Tropical darkwave is the sound of this Oakland artist exploring industrial music's poetry and potential, from the bedroom to the club.

Group Rhoda
Passing Shades (2020)
Dark Entries Records

Glancing at the genre tags for Passing Shades on Bandcamp, "soft industrial" seems intuitive—but "tropical darkwave"? Less so. Turns out, it sounds like an artist navigating Kraftwerk’s “Hall of Mirrors,” or perhaps their “Metropolis” after midnight, seeking a path through unfamiliar worlds.

The newest album from Oakland-based Group Rhoda, her fourth LP and third collaboration with Dark Entries, is a deeply satisfying, lusciously bassy work. It sweeps across tempos and rhythms, touching on Boy Harsher-esque goth-throb pulses (“The Beauty’s in the Waste”, “Twin Studies”), ambient music sandwiched between footwork (“Alibi”), and haunted poetry à la Kate Bush (“Earthly Ark”, “Nevermore”).

Stream anywhere or pick up the vinyl at Dark Entries Records.