WHITE DARKNESS

Nightingale have come a long way since their charming goth rock drenched debut. I can't say the way went up very much. The songs are stitched up hard rock clichés with a neo-prog sauce. Not something that wets my appetite.

It's not bad though. Predictable as it is, The Fields of Life has a number of good grooves and feature the excellent vocals from Swanö who's not hiding his affection for Ronnie James Dio here. If you like the more commercial Rainbow songs like Jealous Lover or Dio's solo albums you'll sure enjoy this. If you liked Swanö's contributions on Lucassen's Star One project you might like to pick this up as well.

Generally the album is very uneven. Most songs have strong verses but turn into cheese due to ill-advised key-changes in the choruses or by the over-abundant application of sweet syrup. Next to the opening track, also Wounded Soul is very good, it's a touching medium-tempo ballad with a good mix of acoustic strumming and distorted guitars. Classic rock track.

Also Hideaway is not without merit but don't approach if you're allergic to AOR choruses. It's unfortunate Swanö takes to Asia approach to prog so much. Otherwise this could have been a really fun album.