Lacuna Coil – Dark Adrenaline

Having listened to Lacuna Coil’s previous album “Shallow Life”, which was exactly as the title says…shallow, I wasn’t really anxious for their next release. But I was definitely wrong. “Dark Adrenaline” is a much darker, more powerful album with great variety in songs. Through the years their sound went though a lot of changes and this album like most of the group’s back catalogue; it follows the same path, incorporating more mainstream metal and rock elements.

Lacuna coil is like any other female fronted group and what I really like is that there is an equal share in vocals between Christina Scabbia and Andrea Ferro in the songs; the switch between pitches and tones is very natural and the transition from one to another is very smooth. Scabbia’s melodic voice and dark presence along with the dynamic voice of Ferro, with some aggressive singing when ‘necessary’, give the songs much more appeal and atmospheric sense that they would without them.

The album starts with “Trip The Darkness”, which is their promotional video and gives us an idea for the style of the songs to come. “End of time” and “My Spirit” are dark ballads songs, catchy, that lighten the flow of the album. “Intoxicated” is my personal favorite and I admire Christina’s vocal while the lyrics “In the world that I’ve created I am intoxicated” stayed in my mind for a long time. Marco Biazzi and Christiano Migibre are doing an amazing work with their solos and heavier riffs that accompany the songs. There is also a cover of the R.E.M’s “Losing My Religion”. This song is so famous that, despite Lacuna Coil reworking the melody, injecting some of their own style and having a pretty good result, I couldn’t keep my mind away from the original version. So I can only say that it was a bad song choice that doesn’t seem to connect to the style of the album.

“Dark Adrenaline” is an interesting album that should definitely be checked out. Fans of the band will definitely be pleased because it’s their best release for the recent past, while those who wanted a darker and gothic atmosphere, in order to remember the old days, will also get their wish.