VOODOO SIX: Simulation Game (HARD ROCK): review / opinion to read on Music Waves

Bands that call themselves Voodoo something, we have a lot on the shelves, like Voodoo Hill, Voodoo Circle or Voodoo Highway, to name just three examples. But apart from the fact that they are often synonymous with (good) hard rock cooked the old-fashioned way, they rarely disappoint us. And it's not Voodoo Six that will contradict us.

In spite of its many hours of flight, the English combo is still relatively unknown. Some may remember listening to "Fluke?", the third album reviewed in these pages. However, its bassist and founder Tony Newton is a name that Iron Maiden Family fans know well, having recorded "En Vivo!" and "The Book Of Souls: Live Chapter". Now a regular contributor to Steve Harris, something not everyone can brag about, Newton found himself behind the console for "The Burning", the second British Lion offering. This is a most enviable patronage that should finally enlighten Londoners of a wider and highly deserved exposure, especially since they have a new opus to defend.

Since "Fluke?", the band has undergone a few changes, welcoming, among others, Nik Taylor-Stoakes at the microphone. Although already present on "Make Way For The King", the fifth album recorded in 2017, the singer nevertheless stands out as the great discovery of this "Simulation Game" that he inflames from start to finish, in the beautiful tradition of the genre, energetic, racy and slightly bluesy. His warm voice pigments the menu with a powerful emotional grain, witnessing a silky 'Never Beyond Repair' before he takes out his claws or even more this 'Gone Forever' that he wraps with a desperate veil.

Behind it, his companions cement a flamboyant hard rock which exudes a feeling as wet as it is heavy. The record is full of instant anthems whose furious stage potential can easily be guessed. All more unstoppable one than the other, the songs are full of melodies as catchy as they are fertile and irrigated by guitars sometimes heavy ('Control'), often tainted with sadness ('Inherit My Shadow') but always elegant ('The Traveller', 'One Of Us').

A classic hard rock without being dusty, eternal without being anachronistic, "Simulation Game" is one of those albums we'd like to listen to more often, whose vitality makes us want to lift mountains. The English don't simulate, triggering in us a saving orgasm. - Official website

VOODOO SIX

SIMULATION GAME

AUTRE LABEL

HARD ROCK