To all those out their moaning that Nightwish is rubbish without Tarja and that Anette can’t sing to save her life – you clearly haven’t listened to Imaginaerum the outstanding new album by Nightwish that blows all other Nightwish releases out of the water. More of a concept album that an actual rock record, Imaginarium is packed full of memorable symphonic metal hits that combine: Heavily distorted guitar lines, twinkly keyboard effects and Anette’s beautiful, but never the less extremely powerful voice to form a extravagant array of metal music magic. This is an album that proves Nightwish are the Queens of the female fronted metal world. Nightwish are back with album number seven and are back better than ever.
Anette has the voice of an angel and has progressed as a front-woman by far since 2007’s Dark Passion Play. She can master all aspects of singing and her vocal range is superb. Whether it be the high or the low, the soft or the powerful, she is by far one of the best female singe
rs on the scene and put’s her magic into killer tracks like ‘I Want My Tears Back’, ‘Storytime and ‘Last Ride Of the Day’. You need to hear it to believe it, and when her amazing voice kicks in……. It will blow your mind!
Imaginaerum is such a diverse album exploring not into just the metal spectrum, but also delving into the depths of jazz and the power ballad. It’s amazing that a metal band experimenting with different styles sound so good and whether it is in the finger clicking goodness of ‘Slow, Love, Slow’ or the soft acoustic touch of ‘Turn Loose the Mermaids’, Nightwish know how to put on a show, and show that their band is made up by some of the best musicians on the planet, that not only know how to write a good song, but to perform it as well.
It’s such a shame that even though this album is brilliant, people will still judge it because it doesn’t feature Nightwish’s old singer. If Tarja was the singer on this album she wouldn’t be able to pull it off, as her voice would not suit any of these brilliant songs. Anette is part of the Nightwish team now, so back off and appreciate that Imaginaerum is an astounding album and Anette puts her heart, soul and mind into every song on this album.
From the amazing artwork to the just as amazing songs, Nightwish have pulled no punches with Imaginarium – also making a film (which will be out sometime in 2012) to go along with this marvellous release. You will not be disappointed with Imaginaerum, for it is the mother of all Nightwish albums and shows just why getting rid of Tarja and replacing her with Anette was a good thing to do! [8/10]
