Tarja Turunen: My Winter Storm

As an ardent Nightwish fan, I was a little befuddled and more than a little sad at the firing of Tarja Turunen. Thankfully, though, she's been pressing on with her solo career, and I am glad to have snagged a copy of her latest release, My Winter Storm.

The first track, "Ita, Missa Est," let's the unwary listener know that this isn't another Nightwish album. The very sweet sounding oboe and strings blend seemlessly with the next track, "I Walk Alone." This guy brings back the distorted guitars, but couched nicely in a very well-orchestrated backdrop, including some particularly nice horn parts. Definitely enough to warrant further listen.

The following tracks reveal some pretty heavy Holopainen influence, heard very easily in a choir section of "Lost Northern Star." Vuorinen's technique and tone occasionally creep in, whether purposefully or because Turunen's guitarist wishes he could play for Nightwish, I don't know. But even so, it seems that Tarja has developed her songwriting abilities well enough to construct a fairly diverse and individual album.

Of course, there are weak points. A few melodies here and there are generic and every once in a while are pop-ish enough to aggravate. Occasionally, the guitars become rather uninteresting, particularly in the orchestra-scarce "Poison."

Still, there are enough wonderful moments in this album to warrant pressing the repeat button. Turunen's voice is in top form, and she's actually shucked the opera style a couple times with good results (I remember a couple disasters of this area with Nightwish). So, it looks as if Tarja may be shaking off the dust of her heavy metal days (the album rates at heaviest hard rock, but even that's a little sketchy) and taking her own path.

Final verdict: Definitely worth a listen, but Nightwish-seekers beware: this is not an extenuation of "old" Nightwish, or even operatic metal. But if you love the voice and don't mind it in a different setting, go stand in Tarja's storm for a few minutes.