Halestorm
Back From the Dead

August 2017. I'm driving the rented dark Nissan Sonic just outside New York, heading to Boston. My girlfriend naps a bit in the passenger seat, as she doesn’t have to drive and waking up early was particularly tough. I decide to match some music with the view of the highway swallowing the car’s nose and turn on the radio to the satellite frequencies of Sirius XM. “All Along the Watchtower” by Hendrix fades out and passes the baton to the DJ on duty, who has the thankless task of ruining the atmosphere by introducing the next song. And he does it like this: “Lzzy Hale’s voice has been compared to Janis Joplin’s, Halestorm will finish the job started by the steaming coffee you clutch in your hand!”

I turn up the volume, even though there's the risk of disturbing my better half. The cabin explodes. That guy was right, I think, getting pumped. The rest is history. I'm not going to tell you about my crazy trip; I’d be off-topic. What I can say is that during that part of the road trip, I became obsessed with Halestorm’s music.

The band is composed of the stormy Hale siblings (Hale-storm), Elizabeth Mae “Lzzy” Hale, frontwoman and guitarist, her brother Arejay Hale on drums, Joe Hottinger on guitar, and Josh Smith on bass.

Their self-titled debut album dates back to April 2009, and since then, with the subsequent four works, the stormy ones have done nothing but achieve great satisfaction. Starting with the Grammy Award won in February 2013 with the single “Love Bites (So Do I)” as Best Hard Rock Performance, up to reaching the fifth position on Billboard 200 with the third album, “Into the Wild Life.”

Halestorm is also famous for their endless tours, averaging two hundred and fifty shows each year worldwide. I was present at one of these dates and I can say that live, they do not disappoint expectations.

“Back From the Dead” is the fifth studio album from the quartet from Red Lion, Pennsylvania, and it’s even more powerful than its predecessors (which, each time, always raised the bar).

Now, I won’t bother the rock legends by saying that the only difference between Lzzy Hale and Janis Joplin is the fact that the former has kept her skin intact and is not part of the “27 Club” like the latter. I’ve merely reported this consideration, which is in any case not at all groundless. Lzzy has an incredible voice that strikes you from the first listen. Scratchy, powerful, and assertive, she manages to caress in the melodic and slap in the more aggressive episodes.

The first two tracks of the album, “Back From the Dead” and “Wicked Ways” demonstrate this to us immediately. Both open in the grip of Lzzy's overflowing vocals, accompanied by her brother Arejay’s rapid snare.

More subdued but not without the same power are “Strange Girl” and “Brightside.” We drum and tap continuously with “The Steeple,” a track with a pleasant and blatantly radio-friendly chorus, also through Hottinger’s brief and continuous riff, which gets into our heads like a TV jingle.

“Terrible Things” is the inevitable ballad, tasked with showing that there are not only rock roars but also sweet words and guitar arpeggios. The atmosphere is more reminiscent of a lullaby than a power ballad, but the text makes us understand that even if it slows down, it does not become trivial:

“We are nothing without failure
But we have chosen ill behavior
With every scar have we learned
Not to heal, but to hurt
We’ve become something else
Even I cannot tell just why”

We get our claws out again with “My Redemption.” Comes the remorse for the wrong behaviors that have hurt but made us heal, like in a life oxymoron. “Bombshell” is driven by a chanting rhythm, with riffs that seem to tell us they're inspired by Tom Morello's six strings.

“I Come First” and “Psycho Crazy” draw from the band’s classic sounds that permeate previous works. This doesn’t make them particularly memorable but still pleasantly rock, also because they are enriched by the usual overwhelming vocals.

“Raise Your Horns” is the exciting closing song, which deserves a separate discussion. The title refers to the name of the charity association (#raiseyourhorns) managed by Lzzy Hale and founded by her after the death of Huntress’ frontwoman, Jill Janus, due to issues related to depression. The lyrics instill courage and the gesture of horns to the sky gives the strength to rise again thanks to music, forgiving the fears that convinced us to turn off the light. You just have to sing because no one listens to the dead and their words:

“Sing every verse, every sermon

For the dead are unheard

Shout from the rooftops while

You still live every word

Cause the pendulum swings

For those who dare wait”

Halestorm may not be a total innovation of their genre, but they make excellent music and improve with each new release. They manage to coexist power and harmony, with a female vocality unique in its versatility. There are incredible timbres like those of Amy Lee, Cristina Scabbia, Floor Jansen, and indeed Lzzy Hale, who is today part of this group of frontwomen as beautiful as they are charismatic and talented.

It remains to be decided, if one wants to discover Halestorm’s music, where to start.

This time, I recommend starting from the end.