Last week I received two albums by Mr. J.R. Blackmore. The cd "Holding On" (remastered) has been reviewed separately on Rockezine. The album "Between Darkness And Light" was originally released in May 2006.
This album is actually a project of J.R. Blackmore and Malte Rathke. The first doesn’t need any further introduction. The other musician, Malte Rathke, is an old friend of Blackmore. In the late 80`s he played with Blackmore in the band J.R. Blackmore`s Superstition. A few years later Rathke left the band. In the following years, he discovered his love for film music, still is a strong influence in his present day music.

In 2004 Rathke and Blackmore came together again to work on new projects. Rathke developed many ideas for outstanding compositions, which perfectly matched Blackmore`s vision of the new project: "Between Darkness And Light" was born.

"Between Darkness And Light" is an instrumental album with a lot of classical and movie soundtrack influences.

People who like guitar solos, symphonic keyboard sounds, heavy riffs and nice compositions should definitely listen to this cd.
The intro to the first song, the title track, is quite bombastic, followed by guitar solos (acoustic and electric) which are played sensitively and the keyboards of Rathke on the background. Some songs on the album up-tempo (Nine Lives, Total Eclipse), most songs however are midtempo songs with a lot of classical influences.

The risk of an instrumental cd is that the riffs and melodies in the songs sound like each other, it makes the songs less interesting to listen to and it becomes boring. Fortunately Blackmore and Rathke didn`t make this mistake, "Between Darkness And Light" is a cd with great melodies, a lot of guitar solos, great keyboard sound, and varied songs (heavy, symphonic, midtempo). I really like this symphonic rock album, so put on your headphones and enjoy it.