Another year, another Doro album and at this point it’s a bit like a pudding after a good meal – You know you will enjoy it but hardly essential

Conqueress: Strong and Proud follows the same template laid down with her debut album Force Majeure (34 years ago!) with a mix of old school heavy metal, ballads and the odd duet/cover all housed in artwork that is so distinctively Doro. 

At 15 songs it’s far too long. I never need to hear the awful Lean, Mean Rock Machine, a sort of hackneyed metal version of Greased Lightning with some terrible lyrics or the butchered Total Eclipse of the Heart duet with Rob Halford ever again.

There is still some great fun to be had – The rollicking All for You or the naggingly catchy Bond Unending for example.

There is also a much better duet with Rob Halford on Living After Midnight. You can clearly hear the enjoyment both are having with the song as they trade lines.

For someone celebrating 40 years in the business, Doro’s voice is still in fine form 

Never going to be album of the year but I still wouldn’t miss out on it.

 Now this is fun – The latest album from the musical chameleon that is Myrkur.

Spine, like her previous works, is almost another change in musical direction but still with that DNA that links all her releases.

9 track and only 38 minutes long it’s a short but thrilling ride.

The black metal of the first couple of albums has almost been fully done away with except for occasional traces (the short burst of blast beat drums in Like Humans or the metal shrieks as backing vocals in Mothlike) and the folk influences are a lot less noticeable

A lot of the songs put that gorgeous voice front and centre with the music built around it - See the stunning piano ballad of My Blood is Gone for example. 

Like Humans is a perfectly formed pop song and those synths in Mothlike are as catchy as hell but both songs still have those eccentricities you only get with Myrkur.

Valkyrienes Sang is the closest track musically to old school black metal but topped with those clean crystalline vocals rather than the screams of yore.

A word also about the artwork which is just so beautiful.

Another album of the year contender 

 An odd review as I’m still not sure about the album. The Fell is the latest from Snow Ghosts and described as a collection of “old folk songs that were never written” which is as good as a description as you could give.

So, it’s folk but with the electronic ‘strangeness’ that the band have bought to their previous releases. It’s very atmospheric and a really pleasurable listen (especially with headphones) especially the pulsing Curse and the swirling electronica of Magpie

But:

Give it an hour or so and I struggle to recall any individual tracks, just a memory that I enjoyed it.

Possibly because of trying to tie all the songs into a theme it loses out on individuality, but I’m just not sold on the album as I have been with previous offerings.

It’s strange and I can’t put my finger on the problem, but I will persevere with it.

 There is an album to be reviewed here but I think the post is more to do with a modern trend for which Taylor Swift seems responsible for – That is re-recording your old albums.

It seems a lot of the time unnecessary and just done for the money or a massive ego (hi there, Roger Waters) but I also understand an artist wanting control of their music.

I think whether I would bother to investigate a re-recorded version would depend on my emotional attachment to the original. For example, I have no wish to hear Waters version of Dark Side of the Moon as I love the original but I’m happy to give the Cavalera Conspiracy take on Bestial Devastation a go as I have only had a fleeting acquaintance with the 1985 release.

So, the Cavalera brothers have decided to re-record the debut EP from Sepultura and it’s a very good listen if you already like their work.

It’s only 20 minutes long and that’s including a new track  

Musically it’s fantastic, lyrically its terrible (originally written in Portuguese, the band got a friend to translate directly to English). The sound is as brutal and fast as you expect with some spectacular drumming from Igor.

Whilst I enjoy the EP and it bears repeated listening, I still find myself asking, is it actually necessary?

 Weirdly this is the second review in a row where a bands goes orchestral - In this case it's the New Model Army with Sinfonia.

As before with the PSB album this is superbly done. As you would expect from New Model Army this is not just bolting on some strings to the hits, this is so much more.

An overture of orchestral snippets from some songs to come tease you in before the tumbling, tribal drums power you through the Devil's Bargain. A statement of intent.

There is a lot more between song chat which is quite fun (as Justin notes, with orchestras there isa lot of page turning)

Other highlights include Winter which works so well in this format that it suddenly becomes one of my favourite NMA songs - "I fear the age of consequence and I wish that it was over"

Vagabonds has an amazing new intro where the single violin of the original is magnified by an orchestra of strings and extended to nearly 10 minutes.

There are surprises with tracks that haven't be heard live for decades - Shot 18 and 1984.

Of course the whole package is wrapped in another stunningly, beautiful bit of artwork from Joolz.

This is the sound of my favourite band, becoming better and better. Love them. Always.

 It’s been a whole year but finally the recording of the Public Service Broadcasting love letter to the BBC performed at the Proms has been released. 

This New Noise encapsulates all that is so brilliant about this band – The imagination, the story telling and, in this case, seamlessly adding an 80 piece orchestra to the mix.

 

A lot of bands add strings to their songs, but this is a whole new level of sound and is done to absolute perfection. The orchestration makes everything sound so huge and heroic without overshadowing the band at the centre of it. 

 

It’s not a long album (50mins) and need to be heard as a whole rather than as individual tracks. It’s a more sedate, grandiose statement than previous albums and there’s not a Blue Heaven or Gagarin to get your feet twitching but it’s no worse for that.

 

Highlights include the bombastic This New Noise, the terribly British sample at the beginning of Broadcasting House and the 9 minute epic of The Microphone which even includes some of Lit Up from the debut album.

 

The inclusion of Seth Lakeman to provide vocals on the A Cello Sings in Daventry is an interesting interlude that adds some variety among the samples (which as always on a PSB album are impeccable in their context and use).

 

I remember watching the Prom and hoping it would be recorded and thankfully they did an amazing job with it. Need to get myself a vinyl copy of this as soon as possible.

 

 If you decide to give this album a try, it will probably be the strangest thing you hear this year

Fractured Whole is by an American musician Megan Mitchell, going by the name of Cruel Diagonals.

The thing to understand is the whole album is a collage of sampled sounds of her voice, all electronically distorted, stretched and twisted. There are no other instruments to be heard which at times is difficult to get your head round

Opening track, Penance, is like a Latin mass being conducted in a warehouse full of synthesizers which are being tested to make sure they still work.

Full of unsettling electronic soundscapes topped with the wordless soprano type voice it has the feel of an aural art installation rather than a musical album

It’s a challenging listen and depending on how Avant Garde you like your art; it is likely to be a step too far for many. However, considering what they have achieved and how it was constructed you have to admire the courage it takes to attempt something this daring.