Thundermother – "Black and Gold"
"You're struck by lightning..."
With age, after having heard all the more music throughout your life, you become all the harder to impress. Those surprises become fewer and farther between when a band comes straight outta left field and knocks your socks off.
Well, boys and girls. Straight outta left field, enter Thundermother.
Apparently, this band of Swedish jenter have been around since 2009 and released five albums. In 2017, everyone except founder/guitarist Filippa Nässil quit, which led her to the decision of hiring three new members. And boy, am I glad she did.
Because holy shit, do these chicks not only rock at least as hard as the Mötley Crües and the Skid Rows that preceded them, but they also write at least as good tunes.
As though it were created with the sole purpose of rocking tens of thousands of people, opener "The Light In the Sky" has me unable to withhold fucking tears. – Tears of not only joy over how pure, powerful, and perfect hard rock music can still be, but tears of hope for the entire future of hard rock and heavy metal in an era where the veterans are slowly either throwing in the towel or simply dying on us.
Yeah, that's right: This album is so good it makes me fucking cry. How often does a new band do that to you??
And it pretty much just goes on from there. This is not only perfectly written; the quality also stays at the same top-tier level throughout the entire album. Again: How often does any band do that?
The album is so professionally done by someone who has such a flair for the genre that they should just plain be getting life-long public funding for the entire band.
The melodies are perfect. The cadences are perfect. Even the "whoa-oh-oh-ooooooh's" are perfect, and the riffs have at least at much gasoline in them as anything Mick Mars or Malcolm Young (R.I.P.) ever played. I mean, shit, the main riff in the downright heavy metal "Try With Love" sounds like something Dave Mustaine might have written.
The devil-may-care attitude in songs like "Watch Out", the title track, and the Airbourne-like "Loud and Free" is so raw and confident that it becomes mesmerisingly infectious – and the prolonged wail in the former showcases one of the band's superpowers: The intensely wicked stalwart vocals of Guernica Mancini.
"Wasted", as its title suggests, is about getting your buzz on. And I'm only getting more infatuated by the idea of these ladies not only rocking so hard and being so excellent songwriters, but also being both able and willing to get proper smashed. And the brilliantly executed shuffle of "Raise Your Hands" frames a refrain that's as touching as it's relatable:
"Raise your hands if you're looking for glory
We all want a piece of the glamorous life
This goes out to all of the dreamers
So raise your hands and let's cut loose tonight"
It might not exactly be original, but it's so memorable and all-round effective that originality doesn't matter for shit. And it's symptomatic that any objection one might have against anything on this album still has its caveats.
For example, "Stratosphere" might have been scrapped, but it's still way over par. And "All Looks No Hooks", with its incorporated harmonics in the riff and the descending modulation in the chorus, is far from the best track, but still probably the most interesting one from a music-theoretical point of view.
Also, the picking intro in "I Don't Know You" is a bit too obvious of an Angus Young style approach. And the almost sad minor key-melody in the chorus is a bit of an odd contrast to the lyrics about that annoying backstage hangaround. But again, still: Both the song and the album as a whole are so professionally done by someone who has such a flair for the genre that they should just plain be getting life-long public funding for the entire band.
"The Light In the Sky" has me unable to withhold fucking tears. Tears of not only joy over how pure, powerful, and perfect hard rock music can still be, but tears of hope for the entire future of hard rock and heavy metal.
And, as initially suggested, when Thundermother are at their best, they're near-untouchable. Apart from the opener, this is especially obvious in the power ballad waltz of "Hot Mess" which is more Bon Jovi than Bon Jovi's been for the last 30 years, and in the ending "Borrowed Time" with a chorus so surging and a lyric so human that the quality level starts to become universal rather than genre-specific:
"We've been here before
Many times around
Shakes me to the core
Every single night
I don't want to live forever
But I know it's just a lie
It's just borrowed time"
It's few factors that keep this masterful output from couping the title "Album of the Year" from Magnum or Porcupine Tree. And after having heard it, I am all the more bitter about not seeing Thundermother at this year's Copenhell. But it shouldn't take that much justice in the world to ensure that I'll be having the chance again for many years to come.
On the contrary, that would only be fair.
Rating: 5.5 out of 6
Genre: Hard rock / heavy metal
Release date: 16/8/2022
Label: AFM
Producer: Søren Andersen (Denmark representin'!)