Twin brothers Anthony and Nicholas LaBarbera have been building Dual Variant out of London, Ontario, since 2021, and the concept is simple: bass, drums, vocals, nothing else. No guitar, no keys, no safety net. The Royal Blood and Death From Above 1979 influence is obvious, and four years in, they’ve gotten very good at making two instruments sound like a full band. “Against All Odds” came out February 3rd and follows their 2025 singles “Lover Girl” and “A Better Tomorrow.”
The first thing that hits you in this song is the powerful, distorted bass sound right off the bat; it instantly sets a great, grimy mood. It’s so heavy in how it locks in with the drums and how it’s played and executed; it just sounds so big, which works in the song’s favor because the bass here is carrying all the harmonic information to support the vocals ,which I did not know on my first listen actually I thought there was a guitar on top of the bass parts, but nope there are no keyboards, no guitar, no additional layers. It’s just drums and bass with the vocals on top, and somehow it manages to sound like a huge wall of sound.
Anthony’s quote about the track is pretty straightforward: “This one gets us going.” Hard to argue with that. “Against All Odds” is a blunt, kinetic rock song that does exactly what it promises.
