confirms that there is still talent around to be discovered and that electronic music can still be more than just the average boom-boom club noise of today!
This one-man American band fits into the electro/industrial rock genre that mixes trashy guitar with depressive piano rolls, and aggressive intricate electronics all fused together with
's raging sexuality, and high energy synthesizers. All these elements all bundled up collide with personal demons and powerful attitude.
Drawing from influences as diverse as
Depeche Mode,
Peter Gabriel,
Ministry or yet
Rob Zombie, but it is with
Nine Inch Nails' early and more aggressive days that
Halo In Reverse's music is the most easily compared to. If obviously following the direction brought by
Trent Reznor,
Joshua Steffen is definitely doing his own thing, combining emotional melodies with caustic synthesizer and guitar textures, mixing the organic with the synthetic in a mélange that is as enticing as it is aggravating. His most striking and dominant unique characteristic is within his passionate and intoxicating voice: strong, decadent, artfully lustrous and dreamy.
On "Trials and Tribulations",
Halo In Reverse presents the ultimate display of an artist taking his powers to his utmost, focusing on musicianship and solid songwriting resulting in both great music and strong lyrics. An album that reveals awesome production work and a degree of musicianship seldom seen around these parts, on which the music just flows and influences combine fluidly. An album filled with emotion and the pain that only love can bring us when it is no longer returned.
Betrayal, bitterness, depression and sexuality bring the setting of this industrial/electro pop-rock chef d'oeuvre of pure sensual intensity you will play again, and again, and again... and again until the tears end up rolling... A cleansing experience!
