Album review: AUDREY HORNE – Pure Heavy
Napalm Records [Release date 26.09.14]
Audrey Horne return with their new album just over a year since the highly enjoyable ‘Youngblood’. Most of the band members are also in death/black metal bands, yet Audrey Horne is more a homage to the classic rock of bands like Van Halen, Thin Lizzy and Iron Maiden.
Kicking off with ‘Wolf In My Heart’ you can hear why the band are so good, as they have that unnerving act of penning highly catchy metal/hard rock songs. Vocalist Toschie is perfect for this style of music, possessing both the power and melody to soar above the music, as can be heard on ‘Holy Roller’, a song made for live shows.
Guitarists Ice Dale and Thomas Tofthagen have fun trading Thin Lizzy approved solos on the lead song ‘Out Of The City’ (check out the fun puppet-led video on YouTube). ‘Tales From The Crypt’ keeps the fun element alive, with a big fat 80’s metal riff and name checking Dave Lee Roth, Nikki Sixx and other 80’s hair metal heroes. ‘Boy Wonder’ wraps the album up with a bang, featuring more impressive guitar duelling.
A couple of songs have yet to gel like ‘Volcano Girl’ and they throw in a curveball in the short, almost ballad-like ‘Diamond’.
Great fun from start to finish and if you like 80’s rock/metal get into Audrey Horne now! ****
Review by Jason Ritchie
Vocalist Toschie answers a few questions for us…
What have you got planned for the next few months e.g. recording, new musical projects etc.
We are first of all starting our European tour in Germany on the 26th of November. We will take 77 and Pet the Preacher with us and and head out to do some killer shows. We have just finished a bunch of dates in Norway, so until the tour we will spend our time rehearsing and probably write some new songs, as we still are in a very creative flow.
Who came up with the novel sticker idea for promoting ‘Pure Heavy’? What a cool idea and the fan who wins the roadie prize will be very pleased I’d imagine!
That was our management. They are pretty good at coming up with cool ideas for promotion, and so we listen to them a lot on these matters. The prices one can win are pretty cool, and we like these kinds of ideas as it is a way to get closer in touch with our audience. As a band you should never forget that they are the reason that we are able to do what we do.
Who came up with the idea of using puppets in the lead song ‘Out Of The City’? Does the band get good feedback from the YouTube videos and do you think this helps bring in new fans?
This was also a collaboration between us and our management. As a band we are blessed with a management that listen to us and respects us, and vice versa. They also work their asses off for us, and always come up with good ideas to push the band further when it comes to an audience.
The idea sprung out from us using the Muppet Show theme as an intro to our live shows. The Muppet Show always had famous guests on their show, and it is the interaction between puppets and humans that makes it good, and funny. So we got in touch with Johan from Amon Amarth, as we knew him quite well already, and asked if he wanted to be a part of this video along with his wife, Maria. He said yes on the spot, and it turned out really cool. I guess a good video can help pushing a song towards a new audience and hopefully it will do so with “Out of the city” as well.
Could you take us through the new album ‘Pure Heavy’ ? e.g. ideas behind the songs, song writing process
We have written all the songs together as a band in our rehearsing studio between tours after the ‘Youngblood’ album. We always get together and jam out a song from ideas that usually Espen, IceDale and Thomas brings to the table. We simply play out things that we feel are songs we would run out and buy ourselves so to speak. Most of them are the result of pure joy from playing. I write the lyrics in the end, and then we track them as live as possible in studio. This gives the songs on the album a more live energy, and it makes the whole recording process way more interesting and fun for us. The only song that was written earlier was “Diamond”, which was a left over from our second album ‘Le Fol’. We figured it was perfect as a “breathing point” on this album, so we picked it up again and recorded it fresh for this album.
You have a European tour coming up. How do you decide upon a set list and how many new songs do you like to put into the set?
Normaly we try out different songs in different orders to make the best possible show, so this is a matter of “kill your darlings”, as there are always several songs we want to play. We always want to play as much new stuff as possible, as these are the most exciting ones for us since we have not played them a thousand times before. On this tour it will mostly be songs from our last three albums. There are always some people who want to hear songs from our first album, but we hardly play those as we feel they represent a different band than what we are today.
In the UK you played a great gig at the Underworld on your last tour. Have you seen interest in the band grow in the UK since then? I’d assume your biggest fan base is in Norway and countries like Germany?
Yes, Norway, Germany and France are the territories where we have our main following, but the more we play UK the more we grow, so hopefully the crowd will be a bit bigger this time. If not we will try to convince you yet one more time.
What do you enjoy doing in your spare time away from music?
I am a tattoo artist, so naturally that, as well as painting and drawing. Apart from that I spend my time with my family and friends..good food and wine in good company is always fun. Mind you, the people I spend most time with when I’m not on tour, except from my family, is actually my best friends, the guys in the band. He he, I am stuck with these bastards forever
Message for you fans…
#pureheavy everything !
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09:00-12:00 The Best of 2003-2023 (Melodic Rock)
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