Pay Pandora - Hunt the Prey

Have I said here how I love bands with strong female voices? How I respect bands that value female musicians? I guess I have, but it’s never enough. Every time I listen a band with such strong female vocals with this kind of music, I mean the good old Hard’n’Heavy I remember Pat Benatar. Millenial fans may not know her, but she ruled in the beginning of the 1980s with her marvelous and pungent voice. Her music was not that heavy, but the songs were great. Pay Pandora with “Hunt the Prey” reminds me a lot of her, but heavier, much heavier. If you got intereted, do check her out.

With a sharp and neat instrumentals, Pay Pandora make Chiara Tahnee Lütje voice shine so bright that sometimes it scares the fan. Yeah, my child of the night, it’s true that men fear strong women. Chiara’s determined and relentless voice takes over the album leaving no room for anything else except the cool instrumentals. She shines, but she allows the band to shine as well. In a way, Chiara reminds Doro Pesch with the same determination and feeling, but Pay Pandora are no Warlock. I don’t mean it in a bad manner, it’s just that the bands are very different in their musical intent.

The label Hard”n”Heavy allows Pay Pandora to search for sonorities out of the Metal world as Rock or Blues. For instance as in “Let It Burn” and its whah guitar effect much appreciated by Heavy Rock bands, but very few used by Metal bands. Also create sonic textures with the good old pentatonic and blues scales which works great but Metal musicians seem to have forgotten them. Such a pitty. I have to mention taht in this particular song, Chiara’s voice is stupendous. It is so big and warm that it’s simpossible not to mention it as the best track of “Hunt the Prey.” I can’t help it to mention the title track “Hunt the Prey” and its intro that reminds a lot Judas Priest “Better By You, Better Than Me” as well. By the way, Pay Pandora here use another feature that Metal bands have forgetten as well that is to build riffs with guitar phrases, a technique that was very well used by early Metal bands and worked pretty well. Good reminder guys! Appreciate it.

I know that some fans don’t appreciate a female voice in a Metal because they think it weakens or sugars the music. Flat wrong, guys! Here we have an absurd proof that this opinion is nonsense. Take a look at “Take off” and tell if there is any way to support this idea listening to the big and fat voice of Chiara.

Pay Pandora “Hunt the Prey” was released on January 17th via Calygram Records.

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