Ritual

Second album curse

The history of the music business has taught us that young performers tend to have their biggest troubles when it comes to making a second CD. You can’t bring yourself to keep copying what your older colleagues did already; but you do not have experience and wisdom enough yet to make something good of your own. In line with this, we have come across numerous authors of excellent debut records who later managed only to follow on with unworthy albums, lame efforts to find their own voice. The London-based trio White Lies, the band that soared to the peak of the charts in 2009 with their first long player, To Lose My Life, returned to the studio shortly after. What else were they supposed to do? Shaving started out so sensationally and virtuously, these musicians could not afford even a short rest, even a moment to celebrate their temporary success. Since these ambitions boys looked to remain in the group of leaders, in headlines and headphones, they had to bring to the market another product immediately. In January 2011, the British ensemble presented their album number two marked by the catching title Ritual.

White Lies dance enjoying their lives

The all-around applying of the equally convenient and vague definition ’indie rock’ caused a situation now when some critics, willing to save their time and spare their brains as well as brains of their readers, begin to attach this term to practically any musical event that is difficult to describe or explain. While To Lose My Life may be related to this very independent rock, you can not pull anything like that with Ritual. This time, White Lies built on a great amount of electronic music, while what is left of rock here is its spirit, powerful and somewhat evil. Big fans of gothic stories and depressive states, these English musicians left behind the topic of death, the one they enjoyed on the debut CD, and tried to find fun in this life. Ritual, of course, is not much of a soundtrack to a lively party, but this record, certainly, bears a more positive feel that the first effort by the British band. What strengthens this point is that even the first track on Ritual is called Is Love. This song might be a great advertisement to the whole CD as it gives a good idea of the music that is going to play for the following 50 minutes. White Lies have caught a serious disease, one many musicians are possessed by. Copying dance stage of the eighties.

Ritual contains hits and just good songs

The guitars of White Lies, which used to call for distant associations with punk rock, are drawn back on Ritual. The main part here is entrusted to the old-school sounding synthesizers and a vocal manner that consists of rather monotonous uttering words than singing them, another sign of the golden age of the electronic dance music. This monotonousness, alongside heavy and gloomy bass lines, helped the band inherit a heavy feeling of desperation and tension from To Lose My Life. The musicians were confident enough to place the best tracks right into the opening part of the album. Blessed with catchy choruses, these songs are Strangers, and Bigger Than Us. Both demonstrate all the features of would-be hits, resembling the largest part of the debut White Lies album. Ritual is a different story. The record’s second half presents several songs, Holy Ghost, Turn The Bells, and The Power & The Glory, that do not have the ability to get into your memory quickly and easily. They have their strong sides, yet none of them looks like a future hit. However, the final sounds of the album are more than just promising. As soon as you are through listening to the epic Bad Love and mysterious Come Down, the whole album will be remembered as a true masterpiece.