Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

The acid test for any artist is how they sound live, how they appear on stage and the reaction to the music which has been patiently poured over, dissected and hopefully enjoyed in the home; the C.D. player getting the full examination of its potential as the digital read-out gets dangerously close to a figure in which N.A.S.A. would abort a mission.

For Rosenblume and the E.P. All Through The Fire, All Through The Rain, one things comes over more than anything else when it comes to differences between playing live and the sound of music that plays gently or with force down the multiplex of wires from being read by a laser and out through the speakers. That one thing that sells the music is the voice. Live you hear it, you revel in it, you can almost climb in it and wrap your thoughts gently off to sleep in it; however throughout the four songs on offer in this C.D., what the listener hears is a voice that is smoother than being wafted by a silk fan, a voice in many ways that reminds the listener of Faith No More and Mr. Bungle’s Mike Patton.  For over 30 years nobody has had the fortune to sound as velvet as Mike Patton, nobody has come close and yet in one E.P. that smooth, glossy taste, like pouring pure Cadbury’s chocolate down the throat, is replicated and explored. For the listener it is a great moment.

The four songs, Constant Lover, Lost In The Air, Nerves of Steel and the E.P. title track all combine to slow the heart, to take it to a place where refinement feels as though it is the most normal thing around and leaves it there for a while, safe, content and allowed to feel expressive in its praise to the voice and the compelling sound that appears.

With musical contributions from the likes of Andrew Finney, the great Johnny Roberts, Robbie Taylor and Dominic Hulse, All Through The Fire, All Through The Rain is an E.P. of outstanding class, driven, immaculate in its delivery and outlook, nurturing and hopeful; it is an E.P. worthy of the name Rosenblume.

Ian D. Hall