When your band built its rep on buzzing, two-minute Jesus and Mary Chain-styled rave-ups, releasing a half-time six-minute power-ballad as a single makes a sure statement. Lo, the difficult-second-album is sure set to be different, even if features four other songs that don't crack three minutes.
But, really, it finds Dee Dee Dum Dum's worn-on-the-sleeve influence merely moving from the JAMC to a related band; swapping one crew of heroin-rock heroes for another. "Coming Down" is very, very much in debt to Mazzy Star; marshaling the same kind of reverb'd-out, slow-motion electric-blues. "Fade Into You," Mazzy Star's most famous song, actually works as a reference point. There's scant chance it'll be an MTV hit pushing Only in Dreams platinum, but, here, too, Dum Dum Girls are chasing an anthem amidst the chiming guitar sound.
The fact that "Coming Down"'s endlessly-repeated refrain ("I think I'm coming down," sung with belted-out luster) doubles as both reference to heartache and drugs, essentially Mazzy Stars two conversant topics, seals the deal. This is strung-out, half-depressed melancholy whose dowsing reverb sounds more stadium than slow-dance.
Dum Dum Girls, "Coming Down"
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