W.E.T. : Retransmission

Ooh, it's a new year, there's been nearly a year of the pandemic in the west, even longer in the east. Let us see if record companies have veered away from hyperboilc press releases shall we? Here's Frontiers' opening paragraph about “Starting with a genre-defining self-titled debut, Robert Såll (the “W� from Work of Art), Erik Mårtensson (the “E� from Eclipse), and Jeff Scott Soto (the “T� from Talisman) accepted the daunting task to give that debut a follow-up, Rise Up. After that stellar follow-up, their third opus, Earthrage, cemented a legacy of music which will stand the test of time.“ Erm, no, no they haven't and I would certainly take issue with 'genre-defining' but W.E.T. have produced some solid music during their time. I'm going to suggest that Retransmission is actually their best, certainly most consistent yet.

Led by the olden day version of Ronnie Romero, Jeff Scott Soto, W.E.T. have really got their act together in every area of the recording process. Naturally JSS sings like a dream, I has always been somewhat odd that he isn't a household name but then again, there haven't been many household names from any rock genre since the turn of the century. That said, again, I point out that he's tremendous on Retransmission as is the songwriting and playing. Add in a bouncy production and you've got a super bright start to 2021.

Retransmission is the work of craftsmen of the melodic rock genre. There's eleven tracks but unusually that's not too many and the temptation is to just hit the play button again and possibly again. The album opens with two utterly splendid muscular melodic rockers in the form of the single "Big Boys Don't Lie" and "The Moment of Truth" and the fun never really stops thereafter. "The Call of the Wild" continues the quality mixing modern production vibes alongside a hook laden tune. There's good work all over Retransmission, I especially enjoy "How Far to Babylon" where the guitars really come to the fore. Pleasingly the record isn't strewn with ballads but when one is unleashed in "What Are You Waiting For" its sandwiched between the much rockier "Coming Home" and "How Do I Know" which displays that actually some thought went into the sequencing and I'm not confident that always happens these days. An excellent melodic start to what will hopefully be a better year this year.

Line-up:
Jeff Scott Soto: Lead Vocals
Erik Martensson: All Rhythm Guitar, Some Lead Guitar, Backing Vocals & Keyboards
Robert Säll: Keys and guitar
Magnus Henriksson: Lead Guitar
Andreas Passmark: Bass Guitar
Robban Bäck: Drums

Track Listing:

1. Big Boys Don't Cry
2. The Moment Of Truth
3. The Call Of The Wild
4. Got To Be About Love
5. Beautiful Game
6. How Far To Babylon
7. Coming Home
8. What Are You Waiting For
9. You Better Believe It
10. How Do I Know
11. One Final Kiss

Added: January 23rd 2021
Reviewer: Simon Bray
Score:
Related Link: Band Facebook Page
Hits: 1240
Language: english

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