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I love the sound of female singing. But I generally hate it in metal, usually through no fault of the singers. Its usual context is what I’ll call “corset metal,” over-produced schlock with billowing hair and faceless male minions. It’s all drama and no nuance. Lacuna Coil were actually a good band before they became a Pro Tools plug-in farm.
If instead Century Media and Nuclear Blast signed more bands like Brave, the world would be a better place. This DC band has the chops, songwriting, and, yes, the polished production – Monuments needs only a label logo to go on shelves – yet it preserves its singer’s humanity. Michelle Loose has one of the most wonderful voices I’ve heard in ages. It’s technically adept, yet big and soulful. She knows exactly when to push her voice and make it “break up”; contrast, for example, Dolores O’Riordan’s histrionics in The Cranberries’ “Zombie.” Metal hasn’t had such an appealingly accessible female presence since The Gathering’s Anneke van Giersbergen.
Brave is that rare band where each instrument stands out. The guitars are robust, the bass is warm, and the drums burst with tasty fills and propulsive accents. Violinist Suvo Sor is Brave’s secret weapon, complementing Loose with mournful melodies. In “Sooner or Later,” he even breaks out a shredding solo with four-string arpeggios, the classical precursor to guitar sweep picking.
Many influences enrich Monuments. “Driven” is straight-up, fist-pumping Eurometal. “Stronger” swims in a sea of Pink Floyd echoing guitars. “Forgiveness” plumbs Katatonia’s moodiness, while “Hero” is a swirling stew of prog odd meters and Viking melodies. The poignant “Something to This” begs to be a video, in a good way. (But please leave the wind machine at home.) Monuments has more hooks than a UFC fight card, and will make my Top 20 this year.
You had me at Anneke!
This sounds great. Actually it reminds me of the hugely underrated band White Willow, a strong, prog-minded band with a female vocalist who knows a thing or two about restraint.
Nice. This is even better than their old stuff – all around. I had forgotten about this band, too. I think I still have an old CD of theirs that was on Dark Symphonies or some such label. It must’ve come out pre-2003 ’cause my review of it’s not archived on my old site anymore. Crazy that they had to self-release this, unless of course that was what they wanted to do to have full control, obviously.
not bad. one of my favorite female vocal bands are Alas. its Eric Rutan with this oparetic vocal work……
They used to be called Arise From Thorns (maybe that’s the name you reviewed them under?), I still listen often to “Before an Audience of Stars” and I see that was almost 10 years ago. I’ll have to check this out when I get home.
And yeah female singing is so nice.
Cool! It’s nice to see old friends doing well… I used to play in a doom metal band with 2 of those guys about 8 years ago! I liked that band a lot of course, but this is a huge progression from that and it’s proof that sometimes it just takes time (and effort!) to make amazing music.
Adrien, White Willow sound good. I need more of that and less of Nightwish.
Andrew, I too am at a loss as to why Brave aren’t signed. They’re blowing many signed bands out of the water.
L.Ron – I’ve been meaning to post about Alas for some time, although I still haven’t decided how much I like that project.
I’ve never had an affinity for female vocals in metal. Especially overdramatic “corset metal” (best term evar). I have to say, brave doesn’t help that at all. The few female vocals in metal i do like get much, much farther from this – Sleepytime Gorilla Museum stuff (Psithisis), Celtic Frost (Obscured), and the Jucifer stuff you posted recently.