Ronin – Fenice

“Instrumental music” is a term which, for many people, carries a lot of baggage. Some good and some bad, no doubt. Whereas numerous groups have all but rendered the term redundant by creating works so utterly accomplished that there wasn't so much as a hint of it lacking vocals, Ronin largely hail from the other side of that fence.

 

The nine tracks herein fluctuate between the regrettably bland and the seductive. Opener Spade is hugely forgettable and its successor Benevento is frustrating in its sheer lack of any central vocal hook or narrative to give its rock chops a sense of purpose. Conversely, third song Selce is a delightful, slow-burning slice of Morricone-infused post-modernism.

 

It's the kind of piece that would sit nicely in a David Lynch flick and, as such, makes the continuing undulations in quality all the more infuriating because, had the band recognised their strengths and recorded in that vein, Fenice could have been rather great.