Patrick Wolf - The Bachelor

An album ornamented in the existential backdrop of perdition, between Arcadia and Abaddon, The Bachelor veers between notions of armageddic chaos and the tranquil idyll of paradise itself. If this description sounds overwrought, then you’re not buying into the mythology and ambition Wolf is drawing upon to render this elaborate soundscape. It’s certainly a satisfying lurch away from his last release, the poppy and somewhat bland The Magic Position. Title track, Damaris and Thickets are the mystical, haunting melodies of medieval English strings meeting misty Celtic folk with suitably baroque arrangements. Tilda Swinton makes an ethereal intervention as the 'Voice of Hope' on tracks such as Theseus, lending the suggestion of gravitas the album desperately seeks to convey. If Wolf does overreach on occasion, it is in the all-too-frequent balladry and choral uplifts, while some of the rage incanted by the electro collaborations with Alec Empire doesn’t suggest any more anger than minor road rage.