{"id":83911,"date":"2018-08-30T11:00:43","date_gmt":"2018-08-30T16:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.toiletovhell.com\/?p=83911"},"modified":"2018-09-01T19:56:09","modified_gmt":"2018-09-02T00:56:09","slug":"review-wytch-hazel-ii-sojourn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/review-wytch-hazel-ii-sojourn\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Wytch Hazel – <i>II: Sojourn<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p>At first blush you may be forgiven for thinking <strong>Wytch Hazel<\/strong> is one of the old guard traditional metal bands from the 70’s or 80’s, and that they just happened to be releasing a new album this year. The group is fairly recent, though, only beginning to release material in 2012. <em>II: Sojourn<\/em> is the band\u2019s sophomore album.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><em>Sojourn<\/em> is a strong power metal\/hard rock record with a heavy mix of NWOBHM style. No surprise there since they list <strong>Iron Maiden<\/strong> as a huge influence. The record starts out with one hell of an earworm, \u201cThe Devil is Here.\u201d Strong harmonies and galloping guitars swiftly carry you through a supremely solid tune that sounds effortlessly performed; it\u2019s old-school tribute without feeling hackneyed.<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"400\" height=\"100\" src=\"http:\/\/bandcamp.com\/EmbeddedPlayer\/v=2\/album=328701802\/size=venti\/bgcol=FFFFFF\/linkcol=4285BB\/\" style=\"position:relative;display:block;width:400px;height:100px;\" allowtransparency=\"true\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>Most of the tracks on <em>Sojourn<\/em> have lyrical themes exploring frontman Colin Hendra\u2019s Christian faith, but they\u2019re anything but preachy. The record is a loose concept album in two parts: Side A is <em>The Plight<\/em> and Side B is <em>The Victory. <\/em>Many of the songs in the first half of the record have a mirror in some way or another on the second half of the record, though it\u2019s not necessarily readily apparent that the album was structured in this way.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBarrow Hill\u201d does mark a notably more positive turn on the album, a 70’s style acoustic ballad complete with organ.\u00a0 It\u2019s here where the fuzzy vibes start coming in. \u201cChorale\u201d continues the use of organ, this time starting out with an organ solo that showcases one of the band\u2019s other influences of early church music. Guitars quickly take over, however, making for one rousing and triumphant instrumental track that leads directly to \u201cSlaves to Righteousness.\u201d This is probably the most aggressive track on the record to me in terms of the Christian themes, but it\u2019s also the most elated, galloping tracks and more importantly it\u2019s another track that makes for one hell of an earworm.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"display: block; margin: 0px auto;\" id=\"_ytid_69025\" width=\"320\" height=\"240\" data-origwidth=\"320\" data-origheight=\"240\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/kgoXyqU2JUc?enablejsapi=1&autoplay=0&cc_load_policy=0&cc_lang_pref=&iv_load_policy=1&loop=0&modestbranding=0&rel=1&fs=1&playsinline=1&autohide=2&theme=dark&color=red&controls=1&\" class=\"__youtube_prefs__ epyt-is-override no-lazyload\" title=\"YouTube player\" allow=\"fullscreen; accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen data-no-lazy=\"1\" data-skipgform_ajax_framebjll=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\u201cVictory\u201d continues the earworm train and also comes closest to what I\u2019d imagine heavy metal church music would sound like, especially at that ending with the Picardy third pulling things up into a rich and full major chord. Because \u201cVictory\u201d ends so strongly, I would maybe have switched the order of the last two tracks if it were me, as the final track, \u201cAngel Take Me\u201d is another mostly acoustic ballad that if nothing else feels slightly out of place after the song before it.<\/p>\n<p><em>II: Sojourn<\/em> is a strong record that manages to explore Christian faith without feeling preachy. There are a few sections where the vocals could stand to be pushed more forward into the mix, but other than that the performance, songwriting, and production are all top-notch. Keep this band on your radar for sure.<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center;\">4\/5 Flaming Toilets ov Hell<\/h3>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-48835\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4_of_5-1024x234.jpg?resize=1024%2C234&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"234\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4_of_5.jpg?resize=1024%2C234&ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4_of_5.jpg?resize=300%2C68&ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4_of_5.jpg?resize=768%2C175&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4_of_5.jpg?w=1249&ssl=1 1249w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><em>II: Sojourn<\/em> is out now through Bad Omen Records and Riding Easy Records<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At first blush you may be forgiven for thinking Wytch Hazel is one of the old guard traditional metal bands from the 70’s or 80’s, and that they just happened to be releasing a new album this year. The group is fairly recent, though, only beginning to release material in 2012. II: Sojourn is the band\u2019s sophomore album.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99,"featured_media":83912,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12,70],"tags":[13506],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/772105-Copy.jpg?fit=710%2C350&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83911"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/99"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83911"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83911\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}