Tamed Tongues - a Fresh Take on a Familiar Taste Posted April 29, 2021 By RyanAdams_NRT, Staff Reviewer
What You Need To Know:
Dens' new record Tamed Tongues is a celebratory one. The band designed this to be a lyrical highlight and musical stretch. It takes every song from their 2020 release, Taming Tongues, and re-records them in stripped-back versions with new melodies, sounds, and instruments.
What It Sounds Like:
In contrast to their post-rock roots, this record presents these songs in a primarily soft rock sound, sometimes crossing over into country/southern rock. Each song has an acoustic bend to it while faithfully keeping familiar melodies and rhythm from the original album. Yet, each has its own distinctiveness.
Spiritual Highlights:
The spiritual highlights of this album are abundant. The titles of the songs reflect Proverbs 17:28. Each song is an introspective and personal reflection on learning to tame our tongues. There is a tranquility to the new music styles that reflect timeless truths based in the Bible.
Best Song:
Deciding which song stands out among the rest is just as difficult this time around just as it was with Taming Tongues. The record is still written as a concept album from front to back. I will say, however, that the songs that were originally more upbeat and aggressive have taken up a very different and unique sound. Songs such as "Foolish," "To," and the rendition of "Quiet," are all highlights.
Bottom Line:
If you are a fan of the recent music releasing from heavy bands doing acoustic re-recordings, such as Wolves At The Gate's Dawn and Demon Hunter's Songs of Death and Resurrection, you need to listen to this wise and timely album. Sometimes the music is so different from normal Dens music that it almost doesn't even sound like them. But ultimately, Tamed Tongues' messages of life and death through our words remains just as true as the first time I heard them in Taming Tongues.
