Raucous Road with Sweet Detours
More roar and rock – to invert the tagline for variation (and for context, read my other reviews of James’ music here) – and thankfully there is no change to the raucous provided on this latest, much of that tone delivered yet again through the vocal. Otherwise, the songs are generic in their heaviness: accepting the familiar range. After two weighty openers Ghost (You Don’t Know My Name) and No Blood from a Stone, there is Lead the Way which is a thoughtful if rather naïve examination of America as having lost its way as a world leader (thus the exhortation of its title for a change in order to reclaim…). This is followed by Not Alone, a far less contentious hopefulness to one ruminating on the conventionally romantic, and as rock ballad I do prefer this, including another familiarity in its Country incline. A fine song. Old-school, worship-at-the-Black-Sabbath-alter Sodom and Gomorrah roars back after the lighter asides; The Devil’s Daughter delights in riff and some near-thrash vocal; a cover of War humphs with righteous venom (superb track); there is great grunge in Only Cowards Drop Bombs – and this is the road well-travelled on this album. Penultimate Attached and closer What Dreams May Come do, I have to add, make genuinely beautiful detours.
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