Bloody Mary, a Milanese band with a decade-long career in gothic rock metal, present their latest effort here: a gothic rock metal album. As a statement it may sound trivial, but the consistency and the stubbornness that back it up are precisely this album's strong points. Among its references are still classics such as HIM and The 69 Eyes as well as industrial-leaning evolutions like Deathstars. Influences from outside the genre are not missing either, such as a few darkwave touches, but everything is absorbed and made to serve the band's proposal.
Turning a monolithic consistency of genre into a set of songs that are both varied enough and cohesive is certainly a hard task, but Bloody Mary pull it off, backed in equal measure by craft and flair. The ten tracks alternate furious gallops and ballads ("Did you let me down" and "Judith", a small great gem), with a marked drive towards melody and towards choruses that have a weakness for the easy singalong. All of this is packaged with a high degree of professionalism across the whole sonic chain (recording, mixing and mastering). Professionalism and consistency may not be such secret ingredients, but here they are well spent and let the final result stand out, perhaps not only for fans of the genre.
First published in Italian; in English here. Where it appeared ↗