Artist: House Of Lords
Label: Frontiers Records
Release: 2008
Rating: 4/5
The legendary American melodic hard rockers are living through a definite new spring. “World Upside Down” (2006) made all their fans happy by marking a return to the famous classic House Of Lords tracks that made them practically “immortal”. The general takeaways from listening to the new House Of Lords album “Come To My Kingdom” (2008) and comparing it to its predecessor go like this:
1. “Come To My Kingdom” picks up the House Of Lords journey right where “Worlds Upside Down” left off;
2. The new album has a slightly more polished production, especially when it comes to the guitar sound, which is pushed a bit into the background, so the layered vocal harmonies in the choruses shine through even more;
3. The new album packs even more fiery choruses and more seductive, compact melodicism that grabs you by the ears from the first listen and sends shivers down your spine;
4. The new album is an upgrade on its predecessor, a touch more sophisticated and even more detailed, and it’s here that the talent, experience and know-how of James Christian and company really shine.
This new album is unbelievable, teeming with seductive bombast, drama and anthemic moments (The Dream is one of the album’s most fascinating creations when it comes to all of these elements combined). The choruses are a real treat. In fact, the whole thing is (to put it bluntly, by new-era standards) set up commercially, made for radio play, especially in the small hours, when you hold your girl close, whisper sweet nothings in her ear, and then let whatever happens happen. Christian’s vocals work like magic. His passionate, sensual approach gets under your skin: an expressive, melodically velvety voice that builds on the melody by adding even more melody, in the most ideal way that melodic hard rock demands.
This time House Of Lords have actually put together one of the best albums of their career. Maybe the shallow verses spoil it a little. Christian does turn to spiritual spheres in some songs, to finding the touch of God’s hand watching over us, but all that other stuff about girls and love is just a bit too fairy-tale for reality (at least the European kind). Still, that’s a minor thing compared to the construction of “Come To My Kingdom” itself. No beating around the bush: the new House Of Lords ballad Another Day From Heaven can go toe to toe with Aerosmith’s most commercial ballads. It’s cast perfectly in everything a melodic hard rock ballad needs.
The songs are varied in their motifs, but they follow, from A to Z, everything we understand as the essence of House Of Lords. Mostly they’re mid-tempo, and they differ, of course, in how much heaviness they carry. In A Perfect World is the heaviest track on the album besides the title track. The band keeps the album’s melodicity at an outstanding level throughout and takes care of crafted bombast in the transitions, backed up by superb drum work, while neatly engraved guitar solos in the middle sections boost the album’s dynamics even further. Heads up! That’s thirteen songs, which is a lot, and I promise you won’t find any filler among them, proof that James Christian, as the man behind most of the ideas, is in top art form.
With his vocal approach, James Christian added the finishing touch, and the songs under his lead come alive in an instant! House Of Lords have clearly reached a level of consistency and reliability in their development where they can cash in on their melodic hard rock ideas with rich experience and know-how and present them in a flawlessly hard-rocking way. That’s a nice omen, because we can look forward to many more House Of Lords albums like this in the future. This is one of the best hard rock albums of 2008!
Line-up
James Christian – vocals
Jimi Bell – guitar
Jeff Kent – bass, keyboards
BJ Zampa – drums
Production
House Of Lords & Dennis Ward
Tracklist
1. Purgatorio Overture n.2
2. Come To My Kingdom
3. I Need To Fly
4. I Don’t Wanna Wait All Night
5. Another Day From Heaven
6. In A Perfect World
7. The Dream
8. One Foot In The Dark
9. Your Every Move
10. I Believe
11. One Touch
12. Even Love Can’t Save Us
13. In The Light
14. Another Day From Heaven (Acoustic)
