This is on the very pop-leaning side of dark wave. It's dark enough for October, the second song sounds like Madonna was covering a Deftones song. It is one of the album's more dynamic songs. Her voice hovers around an alto coo. She tends to belt it out more on the chorus which follows a more typical radio formula. Smokey and sensual would be better adjectives to describe her overall sound than dark or melancholy though inner struggle is expressed differently. By the time we are the title track, she is clearly working off of a songwriting formula. But it packs more of a rock punch than most darkwave so she has that going in her favor.
I was not expecting the nu-metal tendencies that haunt "Denial". It is oddly offset by the drum programming as it patters under the snarled vocals at a less intense pulse. This does set her apart from other pop artists going in this direction, I guess aside from Poppy. The album begins to oscillate between the two polarities of the electronic pop songs and the more grandiose, electronic rock songs. Most female-fronted metal bands these days circle the sonic zip code at the peak heaviness for this album. It is more unexpected than unheard of.
Things ebb back down to a simmering electro power ballad for "Caves".It's darker than Katy Perry, and less organic than In This Moment. She begins to emote more soulfully which still staddles the fence. This leaves most of the shadows to the production choices being made in the mic, as the vocals could be remixed to fit into many different genres. When things take a more dub steppy grind then it feels very 2010 in some ways. She continues to belt things out when a more subtle touch could be. To her credit for what she does, she hits the best balance on "Falling Comet" to close the album, and still gets to flex her pipes. This album falls somewhere closer to Radio Rock with an electronic pulse, I will give it an 8.
No comments:
Post a Comment