D-A_D - A Prayer For The Loud

Review by; John

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D-A-D are back with their twelfth studio album "A Prayer For The Loud" after an 8 year gap from their last. Was it worth the wait? Well, read on.

 

If you are new to D-A-D then you might well be wondering... What does dad stand for? The band were originally known as Disney After Dark but had to change it to avoid a law suit from Disney.

The band was formed way back in 1982 and put their first album call of the wild out in 1986. Dad are of course hard rock but the debut album was very much country rock. They had a minor breakthrough in 1989 with their no fuel left for the pilgrims album, with opening track sleeping my day away, in particular gaining some radio air play.

 

Fast forward 30 years and the band are now on their twelfth studio album. So what has changed from the last album in 2011? The band themselves said : "In the past we have occasionally gone down new avenues to try out stuff that was pretty far from the heart of what we do. It’s been a lot of fun, but this time we have tried to narrow it down to the essence. This time around, we are just being who we really are. ‘A Prayer For The Loud’ is a record where the focus is on melodies and energy. We’ve made a real effort when it comes to writing the choruses and it’s resulted in some great songs where we were meticulous with the details without losing the original rawness and pure energy".

 

The Danish hard rockers have been hard at work in the studio over the last three years between touring and are excited about the 11 tracks they have put together.  The title track "A Prayer For The Loud" certainly doesn't disappoint, great riffs, great bluesy sound and strong vocals from front man Jesper Binzer. A very very catchy little number which seems to get better every time you listen to it.

 

The title track is the second track on the album. Before that, the opening track Burning track gets the album off to a rousing start, a great heavy guitar riff to kick of the album, they don't mess around, this one gets you tapping your feet and nodding your head right from the offset. After the aforementioned title track, the album carries on with "Nothing Ever Changes", "The Sky Is Made Of Blues" and "The Real Me"" These tracks are just good old classic hard rock tunes with a twist of blues, no experimental stuff here which is fine by me. I'm sure many of you like me, just like to enjoy rock as it's meant to be, great riffs, great melodies, guitar solos and engaging lyrics.  D-A-D have certainly delivered all these elements into the album.

 

You definitely can tell that this is a band who have got years of experience behind them, a well oiled machine. The hard hitting tunes continue with "No Doubt About It" one of favourite tracks on the album, no doubt about it, pun intended. Another foot tapper and no doubt will be a crowd sing-a-long at the live gigs.

If anyone has read any of my reviews before or heard me on the radio, you will know I am the type of guy who likes a rock ballad, it's good to slow it down for a while but still have the aforementioned rock elements, and thank god track number 7 "A Drug For The Heart" delivers. I'm sure D-A-D will have plenty of shall we say more mature rockers in their audience and us older guys sometime like to take our other halves to gigs, this song is perfect to have a wee cuddle up.

 

Don't get too smoochy for long though because the next track fires you up again, and is one of the heaviest on the album, a great title as well "Musical Chairs" Fast paced guitars in this one, and a guitar solo Angus Young would be proud of. "Time Is A Train" slows it down just a little bit from the previous track. It's great how it is back to basics with the album but all the songs still manage to sound different and keeps you interested. "Happy Days In Hell" is a great little number and seems to be an interesting story in the lyrics.

The last track "If The World Just" is a chilled little number to close the album, not quite a rock ballad but definitely slower paced than most of the songs on the album. But it's a very very strong and great way to end a fantastic album. As mentioned, the album is very much back to the basics, which is no bad thing, and every track still manages to be different, it has a bit of everything.

 

So was it the worth the 8 year wait? Hell yeah! A Prayer For The Loud is one of my albums of the year. Go buy it, and while you're at it, go catch them live if you can.

I'll give this 4.5 out of 5.