Night Flight Orchestra – "Give Us The Moon"

Album of the year, and it's not even metal

It was fellow metalheads in my old native town in Denmark who introduced me to Night Flight Orchestra. Fortunately, the metalheads there are musically open and tolerant enough to acknowledge that music is much more than metal; that metal is based on rock music; that we basically love metal because we love rock; and that that good songs transcend genre restrictions.

And holy shit, do NFO write good songs. Not only that; they sound like those wonderful years when rock music had long crystallized, when it was still played by skilled performers, and when the production stretched towards far beyond the celestial limitations of this mundane little human planet.

If you don't know NFO, the reason that metalheads know them and introduced me to them is that it started as a side project of Soilwork vocalist and guitarist Björn Strid and David Andersson (R.I.P.) along with, among others, Arch Enemy bassist Sharlee D'Angelo. Since their blessed formation in 2007, they have graced the world with seven formidable LPs cultivating the golden age of AOR, incorporating elements from the likes of, say, Foreigner, Journey, Toto, and pretty much anything in between early Electric Light Orchestra and later Magnum.

And shit, this latest one could very well be their creative pinnacle.

"Stratus" opens with dreamy, spacy keys and huge power chords. You can hear right away that shit's about to get big. And it does, exploding in a juicy, punchy synth theme and an uptempo drive echoing Survivor. Equally insisting and gigantic, this means business as much as it means pleasure – and it means both things by the utmost contention. Björn Strid carries the Toto-esque melody sounding like someone you would have never suspected of having anything to do with death metal – not even the melodic, Swedish variety. His clean voice, and especially his falsetto, are irresistibly powerful, and as they hurl the chorus back to the intro theme via equally irresistible and empowering lyrics, I am officially bought, sold, and breathless:

"Is there any wonder why I'm spiraling out of control?
Please don't make it harder for me
Forgive and forget, no regrets
As we GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!"

Holy shit, I wish my words could convey the sonic force to my readers here. And holy shit, we're still just getting started. While "Shooting Velvet" doesn't lift the ceiling any higher, its unearthly synth theme (yeah, those are a thing here) has a distinct 8-bit quality to it, adding to the arcade romance of those blessed, colorful late-70's and early 80's when rock music had those exact qualities mentioned in this review's second paragraph. Its chorus makes me think of Starship – and I'll have you know that it takes a mature adult to stand by that. And again, the lyrics just airbrush youthful, hungry vigor in neon colors all across your dumbass face:

"We used to smile just to feel the rush
Weaving dreams at the age of ten
Open roads and a solid future
Whispering how, where, and then when"

The Minor-key galloping "Like the Beating of a Heart", featuring yet another fucking immaculate synth theme, proudly and shamelessly sounds like the montage of an 80's action movie, just like the verse in the semi-ingeniously titled "Melbourne, May I?" is just plain heroic, and its chorus most of all sounds like Toto on steroids.

Night Flight Orchestra are superior to not only any other group which any of its members is or ever has been part of, but to 99.9% of all metal music being released during an average year.

The whole damn thing transcends the sum of its parts. I'm finding myself laughing ecstatically; this music makes me wanna damn it all to Hell, jump on a last-minute flight to L.A., and empty its stock of champagne and Aperol Spritz. This makes me wanna do yards of 100% pure Colombian and go outdoor weightlifting on Miami Beach. This makes me want to work my tits off for years and achieve more massive success than ever before.

I know: I'm getting hella excited here. So I'll just interject now why "Give Us the Moon" isn't a perfect album. There are two reasons for that – but shit, both even have their caveats.

1. While the production is just as wonderfully retrospective as the melodies and the instrumentation, the vocals are relatively compact, and the whole thing could have easily done with a lot more reverb. However, I'm getting the sense that the band intentionally aimed for that aforementioned period between '78-ish and '83-ish, where music production was still raising the roof by a solid coupla feet per year. And still, if all music sounded like this, I would be the last guy to complain
   
   
2. While the songwriting on "Give Us the Moon" is next-level, the album does have, if not fillers, then, shall we say, borderline-expendable cuts. But fuck, you could make a 4-song EP of those, and it'd still kick the sorry asses of all other full-length releases this year, metal or not. This is not your regular case of solid-baseline-with-high-end-standouts; this is a case of the baseline being so high that the standouts are standing out because they're below level "Perfect". I mean, goddammit, how often do you hear an album that keeps on unfolding and presents its strongest tracks after halfway through??

Yes, as the otherworldly immense chorus of "Paloma" affectionately asseverates with a soothing softness, "You can see your reflection / In the stars at night", my arms fly toward the heavens all by themselves. You will remember this and love it with the first listen. This song is like seeing the most beautiful woman who's ever graced your unworthy field of vision and not knowing what to do with yourself because you're instantly intoxicated on an impression of beauty that's so overwhelming that you can't fully contain it. Jesus tap-dancing Christ, I'm starting to get teary-eyed with pure, ecstatic longing for the world which this auditive expression represents.

And the gift keeps giving, and my arms do the exact same thing during the jagged 6/4-time of follow-up "Cosmic Tide" as the syncopated chorus melody prances across a funky half-time via poetic elucidations of determination and destiny:

"With every step I take I'm closer to the edge
And if I fall I rise again
Do you remember when we followed every dream?
Something about us is etched within endlessly"

The vocals of Björn Strid towards the ending here are pure, potent madness, and the harmony voices – just like virtually everything else here – are perfect. Yes, it does sound a lot like a certain era and a certain handful of groups, but with an injection of power which may have something to do with the fact that NFO is a spin-off of metal bands.

But then again, it also may not. It also may just be that NFO collectively happen to be an inspired, talented unit. In fact, you can hear for your damn self that they damn well are. And whatever the case, NFO are superior to not only any other group which any of its members is or ever has been part of, but to 99.9% of all metal music being released during an average year. Yes: I'm a die-hard metalhead, and I just wrote that.

If you don't absolutely love this band, I will find out where you live, and I will beat you to death with a lead pipe.

While the album may have peaked quality-wise at this point, the variations keep on lining up. The upbeat and funky "A Paris Point of View" more than touches upon 70's disco. "Runaways" is more discreet and laid-back, perfectly contrasting the pummelling uptempo shuffle of "Way to Spend the Night", echoing this little Uriah Heep tune, name of "Easy Livin'".

Granted, even after several spins, I still can't keep focus during closer "Stewardess, Empress, Hot Mess (and the Captain of Pain)". Not because it's a subpar song by any imaginable stretch – au contraire, it's perfectly grandiose, wielding equal parts massive power and beauty. But because at this point, I find myself pondering the future of rock and what this band could potentially do to save it. I want the world back which this music sounds like. The happy, festive, neon-colored world where men had long hair, where immodest kitsch wasn't ironic niche-retro, but bold-faced norm, and where radio was cranking out gargantuan, life-affirming rock music performed by actual, serious musicians on real, physical instruments.

Yes, many things have undoubtedly improved since then, but the shit you hear on the radio sure as fuck ain't one of those things. In an ideal world, NFO are the torch-bearing spearhead of a definitive resurrection of aforementioned type of rock music. And in any case, this band is a blessed reminder that the best music isn't any worse simply because it happens to be older than things that happen to be newer and that pander to digitally addicted dyslexics who get neuroses if their Instagram posts aren't getting enough likes.

It pains me that this album isn't hard enough to count towards my yearly Top 10 – especially seeing as how I've just reviewed the newest LP from NFO's fine countrymen in Hellacopters, which is also retrospective rock in a nutshell. But I gotta draw the line somewhere.

Either way, if you don't absolutely love this band, I will find out where you live, and I will beat you to death with a lead pipe. And also either way, it may be of vital importance for rock itself that this band treats itself as the primary priority for any of its members.

Dear Night Flight Orchestra: For all that's good and great in the world, please keep on making said world a better place by keeping on doing what you're doing.

Rating: 5.5 out of 6

Genre: Rock / AOR
Release date: 31/1/2025
Label: Napalm Records
Producer: Night Flight Orchestra