Artist: Ten
Label: Frontiers Records
Released: 2012
Running time: 68:55
Rating: 3.8/5
Ten are kicking again. After the so-so »The Twilight Chronicles« they fell into a long stretch of silence, then came back in 2011 with the phenomenal »Stormwarning«, which showed that Gary Hughes and company had found that sweet middle ground again: pompous melodic bombast in just the right dose, mixed with inspired riffing and sharp arranging. For a band filed under melodic rock like Ten, that even means (over)indulgently lavish, dynamic arrangements.
»Heresy And Creed« tries hard to follow its excellent predecessor »Stormwarning«. After the opening prelude Gates Of Jerusalem, an instrumental, the album soars on the wings of typical Ten bombast and a knack for high-grade melodic plasma with Arabian Knights (a logical Arabian “extension” of the intro), with a commanding chorus and tons of atmosphere. The next track, Gunrunning, keeps up that dynamic contrast and momentum. It also came out as the promo single, with a video made for it.
The excellent production keeps the sonic backdrop wonderfully pragmatic and massive, built on the dialogue between a solid guitar riff and rich keyboard harmonies. You can’t miss it, and in this respect »Heresy And Creed« is certainly a gem. The fresh, creative, wonderfully matched pairing of guitarists Dan Mitchell and John Halliwell, who deliver superb soloing on top of the basic guitar figures Ten’s music demands, keeps impressing throughout the album.
But a few things start to bug me now and then. For instance, the main chorus melody of The Lights Go Down recalls, in how it develops, a sped-up version of the Whitesnake song Aint’ No Love In The Heart Of The City. Right after it comes Raven’s Eye, which, as a ballad, could have been one of the record’s highlights, with a Celtic melody woven into the verse and a great transition into the chorus crescendo, if only the verse melody didn’t pull toward the evergreen Simon And Garfunkel classic Bridge Over Trouble Water. The Priestess, too, with its framework and its touch of blues clutching at the band’s melodic rock form, recalls something Whitensake once wrote.
After the “mash-up” Insatiable, the excellent Another Rainy Day lifts the album back onto its wings near the end, with the recognizable sentiment of the old Ten school. With the keyboards pushing to the front of the song’s sound structure, this “semi-ballad rocker” (considering how the lead melodies develop) comes close to the good old arranging of Asia. The sped-up Unbelievable, with its more ravenous lead melodies, carries the album almost back to the intensity of the opening stretch, which is welcome, even downright desirable.
Putting a ballad at the end of an album can be a double-edged sword. Luckily, The Riddle is an excellent ballad and one of the album’s best moments, bringing the record safely into port and leaving the feeling that this is yet another very high-quality Ten album. In its final minute, the Celtic ornaments woven into the core of the backing, the backdrop of the soundscape, recall the kind of melody Coldplay use to win over the masses with ease, but it’s played and folded into the glow of Ten’s strict musical rhetoric.
Otherwise the album sticks to Gary Hughes’s typical arranging form, which is why »Heresy And Creed« is a typical Ten album – you can hardly get more “Ten-ish” than this. And what matters most: it carries the trademark of the band’s recognizable musical character. Gary Hughes’s distinctive vocal color and interpretive approach are basic elements of that recognizability, and, as mentioned, the emphasized contrast of the bombastic “melotragedy” of Ten’s theater is with us too. The British school, no question. Melancholic, tragic, and at the same time bombastic and ravenous!
Despite a few remarks about possible arrangement parallels with other acts, the new Ten album is still extremely high-quality and very polished. It shows that Gary Hughes caught yet another moment of full inspiration in the studio, once again masterfully capitalizing on his untold talents as a musical genius. Let’s also mention that Gary, among other things, wrote the music for no fewer than three solo studio albums by Magnum singer Bob Catley, and his rock opera »Once and Future King«, with its “all star” lineup of guest musicians, is also well known and firmly lodged in connoisseurs’ ears. In terms of arranging and atmosphere, »Heresy And Creed« stands at a high level.
It’s just that the new album doesn’t reach the same level of sharpness as its predecessor »Stormwarning«. Perhaps also because it came out only a year and a half after »Stormwarnig«, so the new album sounds very much like its predecessor. But I won’t ramble on. »Heresy And Creed« is an album that will definitely thrill Ten fans, proving the band keeps maturing like good old wine.
Line-up
Gary Hughes – vocals, guitar, programming
Dan Mitchell – guitar
John Halliwell – guitar
Steve McKenna – bass guitar
Darrel Treece-Birch – keyboards
Max Yates – drums, percussion
Production
Dennis Ward & Gary Hughes
Track list
1. The Gates Of Jerusalem (Instrumental)
2. Arabian Knights
3. Gunrunning
4. The Lights Go Down
5. Raven’s Eye
6. Right Now
7. Game Of Hearts
8. The Last Time
9. The Priestess
10. Insatiable
11. Another Rainy Day
12. Unbelievable
13. The Riddle
