PRIEST = AURA

In a another review I mentioned that The Church reached their artistical top twice (which doesn't mean most of their overall work is quite worth it). The second time was with this album, and from my point of view this one was the best album they have released to date. The self confidence, maturity and clear ideas put into this album are quite remarkable and quite hard to surpass (although they have been close in other albums, specially in the next one).

The set of songs of this album is quite unique and magnificent, one by one. "Aura" is along with "Myrrh" one their best intro songs, introducing a truly epic and fantastic story like only Kilbey can do himself. "Ripple" has one the best guitar riffs I've ever listened and it is among my favourites. "Paradox" is one the first of their songs that could be called 'hypnotic' and 'mesmerizing', all of this in a good way ("Sometime Anywhere" is full of songs like this one), "Lustre" starts with a low guitar arrangement and continues with a drum set and then becomes like a U2 tribute (it is not the only reference to U2 here, by the way). "Swan Lake" is another enchanting soft song like many of the shown here. "Feel" is the most radio-friendly song in an album which is not radio-friendly at all (again U2 sound here). "Mistress" is another fantastic piece of Kilbey's songwriting. "Kings" is the most U2- ish song here (in fact it is like The Edge plays the guitar here ;) ). "Dome" is a Church's classic, with another excellent guitar riff. "Witch Hunt" and "The Disillusionist" are two short, curious and kind of anacronic pieces."Old Flame" is a smooth, soft and precious ballad, continuing with the relaxing atmosphere of the album. "Chaos" serves its name well, it is the weirdest song of the album and probably a kind of introduction to their latter and darkest work, "Film" is the instrumental goodbye for the album, with another epic touch as happened with the intro song.

Summing up, this is the 'masterpiece' that The Church were looking for and couldn't find and sets an starting point to another different musical era for this band (probably the best one.