At this stage in their Career – Aussie proggists Voyager are shortly to release their eighth full-length, Fearless In Love – it’s not about refinement. The band have already been there, done that. Rather it’s all about one word – and that word is MORE.
Since they blew the gaff wide open with their superb performance at the Eurovision Song Contest, Voyager have attracted a legion of new fans to their banner, and for those fans FiL might well amount to first contact. So, the job here is to say: ‘Did you love Promise? Well, here’s some MORE’…
So, it’s all about big hooks and shiny colours – and my how the band delivers, turning their complex prog-djent-synthwave hybrids into arena-devouring monsters along the way. Everything is indeed bigger and brighter; Ultraviolet adds spiky aggression, whilst the stunning Dreamer, which starts out like Saga yet ends up like A-Ha, might just be the most beguiling thing yet to come from the brain of band mainman Danny Estrin.
Submarine shines and excites in equal part, benefitting from some great, eighties-flavoured drumming from Ash Doodkorte and some truly icy synths from Estrin; Guitarists Simone Dow and Scott Kay hold their ends up gloriously too, and the sensory overload the band pile on as the track reaches it final denouement could really only come from one band doing the rounds. Truly, this is Voyager – but MORE so,,,
Promise is reprised here, natch – how could it not be? And the great thing is that, good song though it undoubtedly is, the song that has brought these new fans to the band serves ‘merely’, in the context of the album as a whole, to simply underline just how strong the rest of the material is on Fearless In Love.
‘Are you with me or against me?’ enquires Estrin on the soaring Daydream, and it’s hard, given the uplifting nature of the track, how anybody could answer in the negative; As bassist Alex Cannion and Doodkorte lock into yet another storming exposition of the percussive arts, the guitars take flight again whilst the synths shimmer, raising pulses, setting toes tapping and heads banging in equal measure. It’s kitchen sink stuff, but never does the band’s sound ever become chaotic. This is how you deliver the audience MORE, even when they don’t even know they necessarily want it.
As the last notes of the semi-title track which closes the album fade into the ether, you realise that Voyager have never sounded this alive, this gloriously exuberant. It’s recognisably the band we’ve always loved but – you guessed it – MORE so. And that’s a marvellous thing to be part of as a fan. Required listening.
Fearless in Love releases on July 14th.
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