Gradually carving out a direction for herself again after several years working on various collaborative projects, Australian guitar slinger Orianthi’s second album in two years (the simply titled O was released in 2020) is a bit of an odd move.
With songwriter/producer multi-instrumentalist Jacob Bunton as her chief collaborator, the 30 minutes of rock’n’roll here feels uneven and unfinished.
Bookended by two instrumentals – Illuminate (Part I) and Illuminate (Part II) – there are some solidly rocking tracks such as first single Light It Up, Fire Together and the industrial-flavoured Void, but the most fully realised track is the rather vanilla acoustic number Living Is Like Dying Without You, while potentially the most interesting idea is the super-heavy Witches & The Devil, which doesn’t quite touch two-minutes.
Greater focus on some killer tunes seems like the most obvious goal to aim for.
