Blog Post
Issa - 'Another World' Released 6th June 2024
Album Reviewed by Iain McArthur • Jun 07, 2024
Unbelievably, this is actually Issa’s 8th album! The good news is that she’s never sounded better and her voice seems to have grown stronger with every outing. This is also undoubtedly the best batch of songs she’s ever had to work with too, courtesy of her husband James Martin and his brother Tom, who also did the recording and mixing as Martin Bros Productions at Revival Studios, York. The Martin boys were initially best known as members of Vega but they raised the bar considerably with their work on Nitrate’s ‘Feel the Heat’, which was probably the melodic rock album of the year last year and this new collection is equally good.
The lead single ‘Armed & Dangerous’ is as good a song as you’ll hear all year and it introduces the sexy, hard-rocking classic 80s AOR sound that permeates the album. It is beautifully produced and there is a lot going on, with more hooks than Peter Pan and New Order combined, a strong vocal, and some fantastic guitar playing, especially a couple of neat solos in the final minute of the song. I believe Leon Robert Winteringham plays most of the guitars and some may know him as the man behind The LRW Project who put out some quality stuff a few years ago.
‘All These Wild Nights’ has a good promo video and, on this song, Issa positions herself as the natural successor to Robin Beck when it comes to bright, vibrant, sultry and feel-good songs. I’ll certainly be playing this one all Summer long. Unfortunately, I live in Scotland so Summer will just be a couple of days in August and that’s also why we’re normally shite at cricket.
The album is full of keyboards and great Survivor-y melodies. ‘Road to Victory’ is one such song and it is chock-a-block with keys – in fact, more keys than the punch bowl at a swingers’ party. The intro is very Journey-esque and that leads into synths and all sorts of ivory-tinkling goodness. As if it wasn’t 80s enough, there is even a ‘road’ related sample of a quote from Back to the Future – you know the one.
‘Got a Hold on Me’ starts with some very 80s electronic drums and then gets almost synthwave in a very melodic rock way. Some subtle, sparse and atmospheric guitar overlays build a vibe that is very slightly reminiscent of ‘Boys of Summer’ or ‘Wicked Games’ at times and after wave after wave of synths it all explodes into a brilliant guitar solo, as every good song should.
‘A Second Life’ is similarly synthy and for me is the best ballad on the album, and it all wraps up with a special mid-paced rocker ‘Lost & Lonely’. I’ve only mentioned what I think are the best of the songs but they’re all good, as you would expect since it’s got that Martin Bros quality guarantee and Ms Overseen really smashes it in fine style. There are loads of quality additional musicians on-board too, like Robert Sall, Tabbie Williams out of Midnite City and Pete Newdeck. The album art-work is by Alex Cooper of Arkham Artwork and Alex will be joining the Martin boys for the Nitrate headline gig at Tower of Fire festival on 29th June in Manchester, which should be very good. A double bill of Nitrate and Issa would be a melodic wet dream come true but is that too much to hope for some day? Maybe both will pop up at a future Firefest or WinterStorm if we’re lucky and you can count me in for that.