LAURENNE/LOUHIMO
“The Reckoning”
Album Review by Iron Mathew

10/10

Laurenne/Louhimo is a Finnish heavy metal music alliance between singers Netta Laurenne (Smackbound) and Noora Louhimo (Battle Beast). ‘The Reckoning’ is their debut album, and was released in 2021.

The two powerhouse singers come together for an explosive album of metal – highly melodic and extremely infectious. Ten songs spread across forty two minutes deliver a thrilling aural experience – with both Netta and Noora sounding absolutely fabulous. Not to mention looking fabulous too! The album bursts into life with the heavy melodic stomper ‘Time To Kill The Night’. With its infectious rhythm and insanely catchy chorus ‘Time To Kill The Night’ is a head turner, and will make every metal head the world over sit up and take notice. Title song ‘The Reckoning’ is a powerfully sung mid tempo heavy metal monster. It has big chunky riffs, and drums that just devastate the Earth and shake the ground. And after only two songs, one of the most highly anticipated albums of this year isn’t disappointing, Bringing a touch of the sleaze metal sound to the album, ‘Tongue Of Dirt’ is a swaggering slab of heaviness – the two singers letting their voices do the talking… Netta and Noora are power house vocalists with amazing range.

There’s so much groove to the guitars it’s intoxicating, with ‘Striking Like A Thunder’ lifting the albums intensity to a whole new level. The melodious nature of ‘Striking Like A Thunder’ is highly addictive – the chorus break so sing a long able that if these two tour, this one will be a crowd favourite for sure. Now I don’t know what the touring commitments are for Smackbound and Battle Beast, but boy if these ladies do a solo tour – where do I get my ticket? The most explosive song on offer is the rampant and raucous ‘Bitch Fire’ – with the chorus very aggressive, the vocal grit of both Netta and Noora, a knee buckling experience! Anyone who knows me, knows that I adore Doro Pesch, she is an exemplary performer with a great voice, a great attitude, and a great persona. Over the years I have always taken a look to see who will claim her crown as the “queen of metal”. Many have come close, but right here, right now, these two Finnish singers have come the closest…

…and yea, I know there’s gonna be a lot of you that disagree with me, but I’m not going to enter a debate with you – that’s a debate you can have among yourselves. Entering power ballad territory, ‘Hurricane Love’ is all mellow and serene, and the angelic vocals are sublime. This is definitely one of those lighters in the air and sway from side to side moments. Such emotion! Such passion! Incredible! The albums overall heaviness is returned to the fore, with the heavy hitting ‘To The Wall’ striding majestically across the land. Big and beefy, ‘To The Wall’ is incredibly melodic across the chorus, causing involuntary sing a longs wherever it is heard. And the majestic melodic march continues with total aplomb, as ‘Viper’s Kiss’ waltzes in, blending power balladry with melodic metal and hard rock. ‘Viper’s Kiss’ is a boundary breaking, genre crossing, musical attack that sweeps across so many metal and rock styles that I lost count! Such a wide array of fans are gonna be attracted to ‘Viper’s Kiss’. What a song!

This album has just gotten better and better. And also more infectious… ‘Walk Through Fire’ a thundering, grit driven hard rocking anthem that is just so fucking bombastic, that if it were played up The Alps, it’d cause the biggest avalanche in history! Now all good things come to an end, and so does this album – but remember the replay button? It was invented for albums just like this. ‘Dancers Of Truth’ ends the album with the most groove metal orientated riff on offer, The epic and tension filled swagger of ‘Dancers Of Truth’ is phenomenal – the wall of sound resonating from the song is totally infectious, seeping into every nerve, causing the greatest euphoric feeling ever… Well, maybe not ever, but pretty damn close. ‘The Reckoning’ (the album) is a highly anticipated album that doesn’t disappoint.

Overall, one of the best metal albums of the year, full of infectious, addictive, and highly melodic heavy metal.

TRACKLIST

Time To Kill The Night
The Reckoning
Tongue Of Dirt
Striking Like A Thunder
Bitch Fire
Hurricane Love
To The Wall
Viper’s Kiss
Walk Through Fire
Dancers Of Truth

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