Tarja – My Winter Storm

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Spinefarm UK
Produced by Daniel Presley

After her controversial shock dismissal from Nightwish in 2005 Tarja Turunen announced very quickly that she would be launching a solo career, recording Christmas album Henkays Ikuisuudesta in 2006.

Follow-up My Winter Storm, her first proper solo album, is nothing more than Nightwish-lite meets fairytale theme music. With most of the guitars pointedly in the background the prominent sound tends to be either lots of tinkling pianos and Disney melodies or sweeping strings and operatic choral voices. Boy And The Ghost and Oasis, for example, are essentially epic movie music; something akin to the theme music to the slow parts of Lord of The Rings, with vocals.

There are some proper metal guitars from time to time, like Lost Northern Star in the form of some slow Rammstein style riffs, but this will be counter-balanced by tracks like The Reign which is a 100% classical song. The classical element was the intention for this record, which is a good move because there was always the danger that Tarja would simply end up reproducing Nightwish music, but as with the old Nightwish stuff Tarja’s operatic voice jars against the metal elements of the songs, but fits the classical parts perfectly.

Some good players feature on the album, including Brazilian virtuoso Kiko Loureiro (Angra) playing some of the acoustic guitar, and amazingly, drum master Mike Terrana is in Tarja’s touring band – this material is frankly below him; he’s going to be completely underused – but you’d be hard pushed to spot any of the guest spots as the most complex and impressive musicality lies in the orchestral parts.

Browsing the tracklist before listening I was praying to the Gods of rock that Poison wouldn’t be the Alice Cooper song, because there’s no way a female soprano voice, resplendent with strings and piano and so forth, could every do anything good to that song. Unfortunately, it is. And it’s desperately painful listening. I couldn’t reach the end of the song. In fact, I bailed out after 45 seconds. Horrible.

To be honest, this is for Nightwish fans who only really liked the band for Tarja’s voice, as classical fans will dislike the guitars and other metal fans won’t take to it for the same reasons they didn’t take to Nightwish. Tarja has achieved what she set out to, and sold out gigs around Europe show she still has her following, but it’s the same following as before and this isn’t going to bring her any new fans.

“ fairytale theme music ”

Tracklist: Ite, Misse Est / I Walk Alone / Lost Northern Star / Seeking For The Reign / The Reign / The Escape of The Doll / My Little Phoenix / Die Alive / Boy And The Ghost / Sing For Me / Oasis / Poison / Our Great Divide / Sunset / Damned And Divine / Minor Heaven / Ciaran’s Well / Calling Grace
UK Bonus Track: The Seer

Written by Andy Lye
More: Albums, Female-fronted, Non-metal, Symphonic, Tarja