Swept Away by an Unusual Destiny in The Blue Sea of August

Violinist Joshua Bell and cellist Steven Isserlis are joined by two acclaimed musical forces - pianist Jeremy Denk and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, of which Bell is Music Director – in a landmark joint recording, For the Love of Brahms (Sony Classical). Available September 30, 2016, the new album is a unique project that features works of Brahms and Schumann that Bell calls “music about love and friendship.” Bell, Isserlis and Denk unite here in Brahms’s first published chamber work, the Piano Trio in B Major, Op. 8 in its rarely performed original 1854 version. Isserlis also joins Bell – as violin soloist and director – and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields in Brahms’s last orchestral work, the celebrated Double Concerto (for Violin and Cello) in A Minor, Op. 102. Bell, Isserlis and members of the Academy also offer the first recording of an unusual coupling: the slow movement of Schumann’s rarely heard Violin Concerto, in a version for string orchestra made by Benjamin Britten, who also added a short coda.

A 2005 appearance on a German television program, followed by a tour - throughout which the original four members performed 1981's Architecture & Morality in its entirety - culminated in the first OMD album since 1996 (and this particular quartet’s first since 1986). History of Modern, for the most part, sounds like OMD. There are two alarming exceptions: “Sometimes” incorporates turntable scratching and guest vocalist Jennifer John, who interjects with lines from “Motherless Child,” while “Pulse” is oversexed and awkward neo-electro sleaze, full of bedroom whispers, moans, and yearning yelps. Most updates to the group’s sound are natural, though only a handful of the songs - the placid ballad “New Holy Ground” and the somehow cathartic and pensive “Green” especially - rate with the earlier material…

A 2005 appearance on a German television program, followed by a tour - throughout which the original four members performed 1981's Architecture & Morality in its entirety - culminated in the first OMD album since 1996 (and this particular quartet’s first since 1986). History of Modern, for the most part, sounds like OMD. There are two alarming exceptions: “Sometimes” incorporates turntable scratching and guest vocalist Jennifer John, who interjects with lines from “Motherless Child,” while “Pulse” is oversexed and awkward neo-electro sleaze, full of bedroom whispers, moans, and yearning yelps. Most updates to the group’s sound are natural, though only a handful of the songs - the placid ballad “New Holy Ground” and the somehow cathartic and pensive “Green” especially - rate with the earlier material…

HELL IN THE CLUB from Italy feature members of ELVENKING and SECRET SPHERE, from bands which play a totally different genre, though, but the songs delivered here on their fifth album to date are pure hard rock with lots of party attitude including hooks that can mostly be called anthems. CRAZY LIXX, CRASHDIET, (more recent) H.E.A.T. or even MÖTLEY CRÜE seem to have been major influences here. Luckily, the modern sounds – whatever this means – mentioned in the info sheet provided by the label can’t (hardly) be found at all. And “Lullaby For An Angel“ is a great ballad with a lot of eighties DNA. Nevertheless, there are a couple of songs which can’t fully meet the quality of highlights like the mentioned tracks or “Nostalgia“ and “Tokyo Lights“. A pretty solid album, though. An album with an honest and down-to-earth production which does want to sound perfect…