Tarot - Gravity of Light (4/5)

01. Satan Is Dead 04:15 02. Hell Knows 06:05 03. Rise! 04:31 04. The Pilot Of All Dreams 03:43 05. Magic and Technology 05:50 06. Calling Down The Rain 4:12 07. Caught In The Deadlights 04:43 08. I Walk Forever 04:50 09. Sleep In The Dark 04:46 10. Gone 07:08

I love Tarot. Ask anyone that knows me and they’ll tell you how much I love Marco Hietala. I even had the pleasure of interviewing him on our podcast.

Gravity of Light is Tarot’s eighth studio album and is to be released worldwide on the 8th of June. It’s first week of sales in Finland it charted at number two something that their previous album ‘Crows Fly Black’ never managed to do.

I really wanted to like this album but after listening to it almost solidly for a week now but I’m still not sure about it. There isn’t really anything wrong with the songs - they sound typically ‘Tarot’. If anything they remind me an awful lot of their earlier albums including Stigmata except gruffer and more developed than early Tarot.

Its not that their performance lacks energy either, the band are putting in the life and intensity that they usually do. For some reason the songs lack the real zest of tracks like ‘Pyre of the Gods’ and ‘Ashes to the Stars’, I think this is in part due to the mix.

Marco’s vocals feel too far back in the mix on some songs, they don’t jump right out at you and the ordering of tracks also feels a little awkward with similar sounding songs following each other. When I first heard ‘I Walk Forever’ for some reason it reminded me less of Tarot and more of Marco’s side project Northern Kings, it had that bombastic feel to it which somehow didn’t quite fit. I’ve also heard lots of people criticising Tommi Salmela saying that he doesn’t really add much to the Tarot sound.

On this album Tommi’s vocals are better used providing a harsher higher pitched nasal vocal to Marco’s soft lilting one. I particularly love that soft singing almost whisper that Marco does and on this album he still performs the lion’s share of the signing. For me some of the stand out tracks from Gravity are ‘Hell Knows’, ‘I Walk Forever’ and ‘Gone’ - which tries to be more of a heavy ballad but not as spine tingling as ‘Tides’. You get the distinct feeling that Tarot are trying to up their game a little with more anthemic songs to take out on the road.

If your a seasoned Tarot fan I think like me you’ll still like this album, I find it overall quite an enjoyable and catchy listen. If your new to Tarot I don’t think this will do much to enamor you with the band and it may even come across as repetitive and boring. It really lacks the fast tempo songs of Crows Fly Black however I personally don’t mind that so much.

It hasn’t really changed my opinion of Tarot in my book they’re still one of the best bands out there at the moment but its really disappointing to feel that this isn’t quite their usual standard, hopefully not a sign of things to come.

Gravity of Light is available to buy or download at Play.com

Genre : Metal

Article by Victoria Baker