The Wildhearts are back with an absolute barnstormer of an album, ‘The Satanic Rites Of The Wildhearts’, and it is a belter.
The album has it all and progresses through a soundscape of rock and roll which is endearing and mesmeric with overflowing addictive qualities. Gingers voice exhibits numerous qualities which are transferred across the eclectic mix of styes which the albums track deploys.
The album is carved open with ‘Eventually’ and adopts a punchy and rocky base on which titanic melodies and anthemic harmonies sit which all allow Ginger to exhibit and deploy alternating gravelly and guttural vocals which sit comfortably alongside clean and angelic vocals which all have massive depth to them.
The album progresses with the likes of ‘Troubadour Man’ which is classic Wildhearts, punchy, riffy and infectious while ‘Fire In The Cheap Seats’ opens with a stripped back evocative intro before the pulsating back bone kicks in and then it is followed up with chaotic yet measured, rhythm inducing layers to the proceedings.
‘Maintain Radio Silence’ is punchy and raw while ‘Hurt People Hurt People’ is a beautiful and smooth decadent masterpiece. It is luxurious and endearing while injecting an emotional strand to the track. ‘Hurt People Hurt People’ is a definite future anthem, absolutely colossal and beautiful, I could certainly listen to this all day long on repeat.
‘I’ll Be Your Master’ is muscular with a mature bone structure and certainly brings the party to the album while ‘Failure Is The Mother Of Success’ verges on the realms of a Thrash Metal track in parts, tinged with aggressive and caustic riffs yet keeping The Wildhearts DNA and makeup at the centre of its being, another future live favourite maybe ?
On the whole the album is varied and accomplished, enough switches to keep it interesting and enough mixture of styles to appeal to a massive fanbase. This is a great album with lots of highlights and success stories, a great Rock album from one of the genres leading lights, this is very much in danger of get worn out from being on repeat very very soon.
