Danny Kiranos, better known as Amigo the Devil, unveils his third studio album, Yours Until the War is Over. Kiranos, the son of a Greek father and Spanish mother, embraced a nomadic lifestyle combined with a love of the unusual and tales of the underworld before settling in Austin, Texas. Known for his ability to craft haunting songs that combine humour, sharp wit, and macabre, his recent works have matured while maintaining the qualities that led to his early successes.
Yours Until the War is Over was recorded in a bar-turned-studio and self-produced by Kiranos. Embracing the idea that songwriting need not be autobiographical, the songs combine various themes and topics convincingly. Featuring songs about self-destruction, murder during an armed robbery, the loss of a child, and ketamine-induced hallucinations, it is impossible to tell where Kiranos ends and a character begins.
Inspired by legendary artists like Leonard Cohen and Tom Waits, the quality of Kiranos’ writing, wordplay, and instrumentation cement his place among them. “I’m Going to Heaven” is a story worthy of Waits in which the narrator witnesses the love of his life killed by a crazed individual who then commits suicide. The narrator, unable to accept that the killer has escaped punishment, kills himself so that he can inflict his punishment in the afterlife. The narrator makes a deal with the devil and threatens God in heaven, only to realize that the entire series of events is nothing more than a hallucination.
When listening to “Garden of Leaving”, I was utterly unprepared for the track’s impact. Streaming the album in my headphones, the power of this track legitimately stopped me dead in my tracks and forced me to sit down. With quiet vocals and accompanied by only an acoustic guitar, it is one of the most hauntingly beautiful and tragic pieces in the Amigo the Devil catalogue, in which the narrator and his significant other lose a child.
The simplicity and bluntness of the lyrics add additional weight as Kiranos sings, “The name we chose is all you kept repeating/The drive home was unbearable/The car seat held nothing but a feeling/Our greatest joy had come into the world/The same day she would leave it/My eyes became a window/You were looking through for comfort/Like an animal in winter seeking shelter.”
The album concludes with quiet music accompanying a spoken word piece that is unsettling in its storytelling and honesty. The piece starts with a woman leaving an antique store, remarking on a sign that ends with “life is short.” “She chuckled out loud and said, ‘I guess it can always be shorter.’ The cashier nearby overheard and said, ‘Yeah, that’s what my son thought too. And then he proved it.’ “
The narrative evolves into a self-reflective commentary on doubt and the struggle of mental health: “Doubt is a siren without any sounds at all. It is a shroud wrapping itself so tightly around the mind that it feels impossible to learn anything new, to know anything old. The pressure crushing one thought into the other until we can’t tell where the handle begins or where the blade ends. Compressed. Depressed. They’re just words how the toxic blood keeps running its track. Is my mind the prey? I don’t want to give in. I’m scared of that, too. It’s hard being a coward on both ends.”
Danny Kiranos, as Amigo the Devil, has created a masterpiece with this record. The album will be available everywhere on February 23 on Kiranos’ label, Liars Club Records. He is on tour with Flogging Molly and will be touring the US this spring/summer with Frank Turner.
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