HALESTORM are arguably one of the hardest working bands in the business and so far it has more than paid off. Constant touring and releasing consistently high-quality albums has kept the group at the forefront of modern rock – Grammy wins included.
When the long touring for the 2018 “Vicious” album came to an end at the end of 2019, a new album should be tackled in 2020. What happened next is well known. In between there was an EP called “Re-Imagined”, before Lzzy Hale and her comrades-in-arms ended up in lockdown and they could at most take care of songwring.
It wasn’t until the summer of 2021 that the HALESTORM fan community got new fodder with “Back From The Dead” in the form of the title track of the upcoming album, before they carefully went on a US tour again with EVANESCENCE.
So the new album is finally here. While the last albums were equipped with some poppy and country-influenced pieces, “Back From The Dead” is almost completely devoid of such overtones. On the contrary – HALESTORM have rarely been heard as aggressively as here. LZZY roars and screams in the best manner through the all high-quality songs and explores their variable vocals as much as possible.
The whole album is about the consequences of the corona pandemic and is therefore inevitably darker. Almost all the songs on the album were written after the pandemic began and deal with identity crises, the ability to survive and the return to “normal” life despite multiple setbacks.
Following the opening title track, “Wicked Ways” also takes no prisoners, here drummer Arejay plays double bass drums, a real banger and my personal favorite song on the album.
Pieces like the dark “Strange Girl” or “Brightside” are far from sweet pop songs, the aggressiveness is palpable, you can tell that the band wants to get rid of their pent-up frustration and with the attitude “we’ll make an album like it’s our last ” went to work.
“The Steeple” is one of the few immediately catchy songs and therefore logically released as a single, which is proven by the seven-digit number of clicks on youtube that was achieved in a short time.
Quiet moments on “Back From The Dead” are rather rare, but you can find them at the end of each (LP) side. In “Terrible Things” the famous Lzzy screams remain in the drawer and the soulful side of her voice is in the foreground.
Co-produced by Nick Raskulinecz (FOO FIGHTERS, MASTODON, ALICE IN CHAINS) with Scott Stevens (SHINEDOWN, DAUGHTRY, NEW YEARS DAY), the work has an extremely powerful sound, with a special emphasis on the guitars.
In the second half of the album, the wonderfully grooving “I Come First”, the corresponding title “Psycho Crazy” and the stomper “Bombshell”, which is sure to hit the stage live, are convincing.
The closing track “Raise Your Horns” deserves a special mention. If you expect the title to be a smasher to which you swing your French forks, this is a pure piano ballad, in which Lzzy incidentally pulls off her strongest vocal performance to date. Who was Adele again?
Let’s come to the criticisms that can be made about “Back From The Dead”: The playing time has turned out to be very “compact” at less than 35 minutes, especially after four years have passed since the last album. Furthermore, I’m missing one or two faster tracks in the style of “Love Bites”. Almost all numbers are in the mid-tempo range and sometimes the style is a bit too similar. A little more variety would have been better.
In the end, “Back From The Dead” turned out to be a more than convincing album, in which fortunately few compromises were made in favor of a higher degree of heaviness. Unlike the previous albums, however, the songs need a few more spins before they ignite. The pieces will probably only really unfold live. On the joint European tour with ALTER BRIDGE and MAMMOTH WVH in autumn you can then put it to the test.
You can hear what drummer Arejay Hale has to say about the album and the band’s planned activities here in our interview read.