Tarja Turunen- My Winter Storm (Review + Discussion)

Just want to weigh in to talk about the new album, the first since Tarja was fired from Nightwish (Due to irreconcilable personal differences with both her and the now former band manager Marcelo Cabuli, Tarja's husband.) which I'm listening to right now and want to review and see what other people think about it.....

First off, and this is something I find humerous as well as interesting, the UK Music Retail chain HMV are billing the new album 'My Winter Storm' as being by 'Tarja Nightwish' in order to boost sales.....

Thankfully, it didn't work. I don't mean that in a nasty way either.

You see, the reasoning behind why I think that's a good thing are that the album feels very unfortunately to be a plodding, slow collection of drawling and tiresome music that while very well sang and nicely arranged lacks the musicianship and composition of even the most classic Nightwish albums.....it tries to be bombastic and epic, and very much wants to convey emotion; and Tarja's voice alone does do that to her credit- however, it just simply falls by the wayside in its attempt because the music is very slow, light and quiet- now you may be thinking 'But some of the songs are supposed to be light,' and I agree with you, Calling Grace especially works well as a light and quiet track- but when I say 'Light and Quiet' I mean that the whole album is such; even in the heavier songs such as Ciaran's Well, which sounds very overproduced and has way too much treble on the guitars, and other instruments making it sound tinny instead of overdriven.....losing the epic feel into a more commercial and less powerful feel.

I do however like the fact that the album does it's best to keep to theme, and is very evocative of the Winter theme throughout, which is a nice touch, and shows alot of thought going into the album's songwriting.

Please don't get me wrong, it's not the worst CD I've heard, nor is it nearly as bad as the likes of Within Temptation and Evanescance's most recent releases both in terms of composition, sound and general songwriting, but also in making an attempt to be commercially viable; indeed the CD actually comes off as having an intelligent and well thought out classical vibe to it which helps the CD feel non-commercial, and artistic, instead of money grabbing and shallow as some may have thought this CD was going to turn out; however, as I've said, I feel it lacks that power and energy that even the earliest Nightwish albums gave to her voice, and as such, 'My Winter Storm' is nothing more than a slow and plodding collection of ballads that while well meaning, fail to deliver any measure of epic excitement that you'd expect of the genre.

This CD does prove one thing, and one thing that I like to see- that she is trying to musically move away from Nightwish and do her own thing, and I wish her the best of luck in her next efforts.

5/10- 'My Winter Storm' will be a good CD to pop on and relax to, but it certainly won't be kept in or around the CD player or on my main playlists on the PC- it's not an album I could sit and listen to for very long. An interesting if flawed first release that is inevitably doomed to be compared and beaten by the latest Nightwish release.

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