WHITE WIDDOW

SERENADE

RELEASED 2011

After a highly acclaimed debut album and constant touring, including Europe and making an appearance at this year’s Firefest festival, White Widdow is back with their sophomore album ‘Serenade.’ After their debut album, it left me thinking, how can they possibly top this? But, this band has managed to find away and make a stunning AOR record once again with a more mature and classic sound.

Opening track ‘Cry Wolf’ kicks off right where the first album left off, with great production and enough guitars, drums and keyboards to make any AOR fan happy. Straight away I notice the guitars play a major part to this album and the solos on every track are absolutely amazing from Enzo Almanzi. With a catchy chorus and Def Leppard/Winger style backing vocals, this track would be a great hit live.

The tracks to follow ‘Strangers in the Night,’ ‘Do You Remember’, ‘Reckless Nights,’ and ‘How Far I Run’ follow the same pattern as the opening track, with catchy choruses and a huge snare drum sound. It is clear from this stage that White Widdow is a band that has truly found its signature sound, and the vocals of Jules Millis never get tiring.

Title track ‘Serenade’ opens up with a beautiful introduction piece of acoustic guitar from Enzo Almanzi before launching into the rest of the song: one of the highlights from the album for me.

‘Show your Cards’ and ‘Mistake’ are my two favourite songs from ‘Serenade’ and deliver the most mature sound on the album. With a rock edge, but still maintaining a classic White Widdow sound, these tracks stand out to me from first listen. With a more dynamic structure and huge backing vocals these songs, if released in the 80’s would have been huge MTV hits.

‘Patiently’ is the big power ballad on the album, and with heartfelt lyrics and great music, what’s not to like?

‘Love Won’t Wait’ closes the album with an upbeat feel and a consolidation that White Widdow is a band that will continue to release catchy tunes for many years to come.

This album, much like the band’s debut is absolutely brilliant and any AOR fan or rockaholic needs to get their hands on a copy of this. ‘Serenade’ is an album that will stand the test of time and will stay in my CD player for many, many months and years to come.

By Will Hollands