Hard-rocking Halestorm’s latest a scream
“Back From the Dead” by Halestorm (Atlantic):
Lzzy Hale, the lead singer and guitarist for the heavy metal band Halestorm, is that rare breed of wild child whose path you cross at your own peril, and her aggressiveness soaks through her music.
The band’s new album, “Back From the Dead,” is not for the faint of heart — or anyone with even a trace of a headache: It’s a full-on sonic assault of screams, wailing guitars, pounding drums and booming bass.
And yet Hale manages to pull it off with a deft songwriting touch and a surprising sense of melody that belies the bombast.
The title track is the band’s likely concert opener on this summer’s tour and begins with a roar (as many of Hale’s songs do.) She’s got a great scream, and she’s not afraid to use it, multiple times, on most songs.
Yet she actually has a beautiful singing voice that can tend to get overlooked amid the shrieks. The ballads “Terrible Things” and “Raise Your Horns” feature her tender, sultry vocals that are 180 degrees from many of her other vocals, particularly those on “Wicked Ways.”
“Back From the Dead” will definitely be in the running for the best hard rock/metal album of the year.
Sharon Van Etten, “We’ve Been Going About It All Wrong” (Jagjaguwar):
New Jersey native Van Etten’s latest album is made up of songs about picking up life’s broken pieces and moving forward by mindfully putting them back together.
Notably, neither of Van Etten’s recently released singles, the disco-pop “Porta” and the melancholy “Used to It,” appear on “We’ve Been Going About It All Wrong.” Instead, the singer-songwriter has
opted for a different route with the album’s single-less release.
“I wanted to approach this release differently, to engage my fans in an intentional way, in an effort to present the album as a whole body of work,” she said in a statement. “These 10 songs are designed to be
listened to in order, at once, so that a much larger story of hope, loss, longing and resilience can be told.”
Becky G, “Esquemas” (Kemosabe/rca Records): Becky G is following up her hit single
“Mamiii” with her third studio album, the 14-cut “Esquemas.” “Mamii” featuring Karol G debuted in the top 20 of the Billboard Hot 100 and in the top 10 on the Billboard Global 200 singles chart. The single — with a music video that features “Euphoria” actor Angus Cloud — has amassed 350 million streams globally to date, with more than 150 million streams on Spotify alone.
Another cut from the album is “No Mienten,” a throbbing dance cut led by the pluck of seductive guitar strings. And there’s “Kill Bill,” a murky, slinky banger with the sound of swords clashing and thunder.
Song of the moment
Lady Gaga, “Hold My Hand” (Interscope Records): Lady Gaga is possibly the only contemporary pop star who could convincingly cover Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away” and Kenny Loggins’s “Danger Zone,” so it’s fitting that her theme from the upcoming “Top Gun: Maverick” channels a little bit of both. “Hold My Hand” is as bombastic and romantic as any of her torch songs from the soundtrack for “A Star Is Born,” but it’s also punched up with soaring electric guitar and gigantic ’80s drums that sound like they were recorded in an airplane hangar. “So cry tonight, but don’t you let go of my hand,” she belts as if her life depended on it, pulling off gloriously earnest pastiche like only Gaga can.