There’s something wild and uncontrollable about the Portuguese blues rock warriors The Bateleurs. Uncontainable since they dropped their The Immanent Fire back in 2018. But still, it still feels like their sound has been rumbling underneath the earth, building and waiting, for the right time to explode. The full-sized debut The Sun In The Tenth House felt like a punch in the gut, but the new A Light In The Darkness pins you against the wall and demands you complete attention.
Ten tracks of raw, yet o’ so soulful, blues rock swagger. Thick riffs that grind like leather, basslines that throb deep in your chest, and drums that crack like a whip. But their ace in the hole, their secret weapon is without a doubt the beautiful voice of Sandrine Orsini. A touch of smoke, fierce, proud, hypnotic and commanding. Able to whisper sweet nothing into your ear one moment and then leading the army into battle like a roaring banshee. There aren’t many that have that gift.
Riffs a plenty and solo work so beautiful you would love to hear it continue for another wild minute. All courtesy of the new guitarist Ricardo Galrão, who has sounding like a razorblade down to an art. And then there are those tracks that implore the aid of the Hammond, wailing and grooving, slide guitars crying over it and a rhythm section that becomes the heartbeat of that party in your ears.
And at the moment you get comfortable and bask in the glory of their blues rock you arrive at the final, bonus, track of the album. Before The Morning Is Done shows The Bateleurs at the most fragile, delivering something satin, like an acoustic ghost of a song, with Irish flute and violin weaving through Orsini’s barely-there breath of a vocal. The calm after the storm, for stormy it is. The entire album, tempestuous and thundering, uncut blues rock power. The Bateleurs aren’t just playing the blues, they are living it and once they’ve gotten hold of you, they won’t let you go. They don’t need to twist your arms; they’ve got that blues rock gold. They’ve got A Light In The Darkness…
(Written by JK)
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