by CHARLIE ANDERSON
3.5 stars out of 5
The duration of Beauty Through Pain holds the listener on edge. Jessa Raskin falsely lulls nearly each track to a point of beautiful, melancholy reverie, backed by oftentimes seductive slide guitar, cello and standup bass. The second part of the Grim & Darling duo, Jordan Polovina, ebbs in this enticing, eerie background alongside a ménage of guest artists before seemingly tipping his cap and delivering an onset of bold, hard hitting beats and sharp bursts of verse. The genre is ‘Folk-Hop’, a self-explanatory, though extremely unique sound and energy. Grim & Darling as a project itself is haunting, yet inexplicably intriguing, its allurement founded upon a macabre ambience, as the album title suggests.