Nightwish
Dark Passion Play

No... we really aren't there, no point in beating around the bush, but this time Nightwish have missed the mark. 

This new "Dark Passion Play" is the classic album that leads nowhere, full of already heard, predictable themes, recycled to the point of nausea: if you were already disappointed by the overall better "Once" from 2004, this D.P.P. will not change your mind about the band led by Tuomas Holopainen, as it seems to listen to various excerpts taken from "Century Child" and "Once", all with the serious handicap of having the most common of singers behind the microphone, endowed with a decent technique, but not equally endowed from an expressive and personal point of view.

The album opens with the very long suite "The Poet And The Pendulum": 13 minutes of banality, a mix between "Ghost Love Score", "Beauty Of The Beast", "The Siren" (the part with the violins from 7 minutes onward) and many other little songs from old productions that the band literally cut and pasted, creating this absolutely successful collage; among other things, even the voice of the good Marco Hietala, who until now had proved to be a good diversion in the Finnish songs, manages to improve the situation, even if delivering a good performance. In all of this, at least something good comes out, however, I'm talking about the instrumental minute that starts at 10' until 11'.

It continues with "Bye Bye Beautiful", a mix of "Ocean Soul" and "Dead To The World", all placed in a more easy atmosphere, which tries to emphasize how the Nightwish have become a mainstream phenomenon (I don't want to offend the band with this statement, but it's a fact, that thanks to previously performed good works our guys have become true rock stars). Even in this piece, we witness the Marco/Anette vocal duet, with the latter trying to find, albeit without fully succeeding, a slightly more personal path. The pseudo-industrial break is decent, which at least makes the piece more bearable.

Moving forward, solutions from the past are once again found even in the second single "Amaranth", which, though not shining for originality, musically once appeared promising, as it turns out to be a catchy song, with a truly exemplary chorus; the following "Cadence Of Her Last Breath" continues the discourse started with the previous pieces: strong déjà vu from the past and strong recalls to bands such as Evanescence.

"Master Passion Greed" is perhaps, together with Amaranth, the most pleasant piece of the first part (apart from the opening keyboards), due to the aggressiveness released by our guys, even if the lyrics do not shine for originality, but it's alright anyway, at least this time the piece is pleasant.

The ballad "Eva" is skippable, truly lacking in artistic depth, blatantly copied from another ballad.

To listen to something decent again, you have to wait for "For The Heart I Once Had", at least equipped with a nice melody, even if Anette does a somewhat dreadful job mimicking colleagues much more famous who are part of the pop movement.

Now in this fair of banality and sadness (for the listener) there is a turning point, one hopes: "The Islander", it's a fantastic thing, certainly the best piece of the album and one of the best by Nightwish, presenting itself as a completely acoustic track, without the orchestra ruining the musical ensemble. Splendid the text performed masterfully by Marco and this time even by Anette, who sports a not bad voice, particularly suited to this type of pieces.

Also the following "Last Of The Wilds" represents a positive moment on the album, with its really tasty folkish progress: an instrumental with tags, which slightly raises the level of the album.

The last two tracks "7 Days To The Wolves" and "Meadows Of Heaven", just like "Sahara" and "Whoever Brings The Night" cannot even make an impression, whether positive or negative, on the listener.

I am very sorry to have to slam this album, also considering the fact that I was really eager to hear this new singer in action: I sincerely hope that Nightwish can find a dimension suited to them and return to composing the beautiful works of old.

For now, I'm sorry but it doesn't go beyond a 2.5/5