Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

We don’t have to confine ourselves to the narrow viewpoint, we do so out of comfort, out of dedication and love to what we already understand, we look forward to tramping the same old streets in shoes well worn just because to imagine another world out there that we can reflect in the Wide Open Sky would mean alternating our mindset, embracing the new, and seeing all along that the benefit we believed in sticking to our in built course was actually closing in on us and becoming a jail cell of time.

There have been a multitude of rock and heavy metal bands from the exotic world of South America, and it could be argued that aside from the sensational Sepultura, few have made it count on the minds and emotional feel of the British public. It is a shame, understandable, the effort of taking on a new direction and outlook, but it is a terrible shame. To hopefully buck this long trend of disaffection, Brazil’s Landfall return from the studio armed with their brand-new album, Wide Open Sky and in terrific melodic fashion that epitomised groups such as Journey, the influence of Dokken, and perhaps with an air of undisguised admiration of Toto’s Steve Lukather that fills the air and pushes the pulse of the listener to a new high.

The foursome at the heart of the album, Gui Oliver on vocals, Marcelo Gelbcke on guitars, Luis Rocha on bass, and Felipe Souzza on drums, revel in the sound that strides confidently into view, those wide-open skies revealing the pleasure of the universal before them, the ability to see without filter, to play without strain or the need to excessively purify a set of songs that enthuse the younger fan, but also remind the older rock legend that the genre does not depend on the home of the northern hemisphere, but on all who inhabit this round ball we call home that it matters not the nation of origin, but the temperament of the music that makes it stand out.

Across tracks such as SOS, When The Curtain Falls, Intoxicated, Higher Than The Moon, and the album bookends of the opening segment of Tree Of Life, and the outrageously cool finale of Wide Open Sky, Landfall not only offer the listener a new and exciting view, but do so with confidence and conviction at heart.

A new album, a direct sound, Landfall sweeps all others away with Wide Open Sky.

Landfall release Wide Open Sky on January 17th via Frontiers Music SRL.

Ian D. Hall