After twelve years of steadily climbing the ladders of the music industry, Los Angeles’ Goth metallers In This Moment look set to further cement their position with their sixth album ‘Ritual’. Boasting an intentionally more stripped down sound and a less theatrical posture, Maria Brink and Co have produced a distinctly commercial record with enough atmosphere and depth to satisfy the more hardcore fan.

‘Salvation’ provides an eerie gathering storm introduction that segues into the slow boiling dirty blues and hard rock groove of ‘Oh Lord’. It’s a fine opening salvo and is followed by two more killer punches in the form of ‘Black Wedding’, a hook filled banger featuring Rob Halford, and a killer version of ‘In The Air Tonight’. It is a sinister sounding cover of the one Phil Collins song worth its weight in gold; though it takes on a harder edge and an impressively impassioned vocal.

With such a strong start to the album it was never going to be easy to maintain the standard and a couple of disposable tunes sneak their way in, most notably ‘Joan of Arc’ and the ordinary sounding ‘Half God Half Devil’. Even so, there is still plenty of other good stuff to get your teeth into. ‘River of Fire’, for instance, is a slow boiler with another powerful showing from Brink. Then there’s the dark pop synths of ‘Witching Hour’ with its seriously hooky chorus; nice tune. The title of ‘No Me Importa’ is slightly baffling given the lack of Spanish in the song itself, still, it’s an interesting number with nice touches of atmospheric piano.

With ‘Lay Your Gun Down’ rounding things off with a bit of drama, it all makes for an enjoyable listen, especially if you like a radio-friendly tilt to your rock. So, all in all, it’s a good solid record from ITM that’s sure to increase their already ample fan base.

3.5/5

‘Ritual’ by In This Moment is out now on Atlantic Records.

In This Moment links: Website|Facebook|Twitter

Words by Edward Layland (@EdwardLayland)