29 March 2024

Lordi – Sexorcism

[schema type=”review” name=”Lordi – Sexorcism” description=”Label: RCA Records” author=”Sarp Esin” pubdate=”2018-05-25″ ]

It’s the holy trinity of the music we love: sex, drugs and demon possession.  What, it doesn’t go like that? It does for Lordi.

Although Lordi came into the mainstream public consciousness by being the only hard rock act to ever win the otherwise horrid Eurovision Contest, they have been around for much, much longer.  The Finnish band, summed up simply, is made up of monsters (under the leadership of the indomitable Mister Lordi) who play a blend of hard rock that takes the listener away to a horror movie world chock-full of wicked dark humor as well as arena-worthy rock numbers. Hard riffs, plodding bass, the throaty vocalizations of Mr Lordi telling tales of sexy, sexy evil, pounding drums and demonic keyboards is the name of the game: it’s the devil’s music, to the core, and played by devils.  Sexorcism is the band’s ninth offering (to Satan.)

If you want a further run-down of what Sexorcism offers, I suggest you take a look at the track list below, because it provides a very nice view of things (The Beast is Yet to Cum alone should tell you.) This album is wicked fun, full stop.  While there is nothing new or groundbreaking at all on the table, the monster crew know who they are, why they are here and what they want to do and they do it well.  They do it with flair, a penchant for the theatrics (it doesn’t get more theatrical than Romeo Ate Juliet) and a schlocky cinematic sound.  The cheesy horror flick atmosphere, the tongue-in-cheek, over-the-top lyrics, the puns make for one entertaining ride.  Adding more to the package is the undeniable nostalgia factor – the album positively reeks of 80s supernatural horror without compromising its core.

To that end, though, special credit goes to Hella.  Sexorcism‘s keyboard backing is versatile, strong and pronounced.  From the get-go the album establishes both its nostalgic, 80s guilty-pleasure movie vibe and its dedication to the bygone era of horror cinema.  From the tongue-in-cheek, playful melodies of the titular track to the creepy children’s choir opening of Polterchrist, the music is enhanced immensely by her presence, as that alone pushes the music further into the realms that it wants to inhabit.  Kudos

But all is not moonlight and black roses.  Sexorcism has a little bit of a pacing problem.  The songs are decidedly mid-tempo at the most.  Numbers like Rimskin Assassin or Hell Has Room try to break this up but fail to go harder while songs like Slashion Model Girls or Your Tongue’s Got the Cat dip even lower.  In an album with a runtime exceeding an hour, a pace this comfortable and this uniform a pace becomes detrimental.  The pacing issue also applies to individual songs, as they take longer than they should.  This is made worse by the fact that the songs are very formulaic – there is very little variety in content or delivery, which robs the album of quite a bit of potential.

What you should take away from all this is that Sexorcism is unlikely to make or break a fan.  Those who are looking for some Lordi action, or just looking for some quality rock with some extra frills may also like it.

Line Up:
Mr Lordi – vocals
Amen – guitars
OX – bass
Mana – drums
Hella – keyboards

Tracklist:
01. Sexorcism
02. Your Tongue’s Got the Cat
03. Romeo Ate Juliet
04. Naked in My Cellar
05. The Beast is Yet to Cum
06. Polterchrist
07. SCG9: The Documented Phenomenon
08. Slashion Model Girls
09. Rimskin Assassin
10. Hell Has Room
11. Hot Satanned
12. Sodomesticated Animal
13. Haunting Season

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