I’ve been a huge fan of Halestorm since I saw them at the Uproar Festival in 2010. I loved their debut album, I thought it was almost flawless. I bought the ReAnimate EP when it came out and was amazed at how they could take some crappy songs and make them into amazing covers. I bought the Mz. Hyde EP when it came out. That had 4 songs from the new album on it and I thought that if the rest of the album is this good it will be better than the first one. Alas, I overhyped the new album to myself because it didn’t quite reach the punch of the first album.
Don’t get me wrong this is still a phenomenal album. In my opinion, Lzzy Hale is the best female rock musician since Joan Jett. She writes with raw sexuality without being overly crude that some female artists do to overcompensate for not being male. This album has a lot of that but not as much as the first album.
Also when I bought the new album I thought it was too ballad-heavy but the more I listened to the album the more I realized that some of the ballads are really really good.
The main reason that The Strange Case Of… isn’t as good as the first album is because it has more skippable tracks than the first album. On the first album, there was only one song that I didn’t really care for. On this album, There were two tracks that weren’t my cup of tea and one of them was a bonus track. I find the song American Boys, which is one of the skippable ones, reminds me too much of early 90s hair metal.
While it sounds that I am trashing this album this is not the case at all. Halestorm is one of the most entertaining bands I’ve listened to in quite a long time and The Strange Case Of… is definitely a hard rock album that not only kicks ass but will also having you waving your lighter in the air.
4 out of 5.
Now here they are with my favorite song off the album I Miss the Misery.
The Trench Reynolds Report 