Nickelback - 'Feed The Machine'

A nicely balanced album featuring a great set of songs.

Nickelback just can't seem to do anything right. They either plagiarise their own songs or get pilloried for trying something a little bit different. Critics continue to criticise and yet the band has an army of supportive fans who continue to buy their records; popularity clearly breeds contempt.

Their previous album – 'No Fixed Address' – was, even to the discerning Nickelback follower, a low point in the Canadian act's recording career. Synthetic backbeats appeared alongside mawkish ballads and there was a complete lack of anything resembling Rock.

Thankfully 'Feed The Machine' doesn't repeat the feat, being perhaps the band's most aggressive album since 'All The Right Reasons'. Top notch fare such as the title track, the thrill-ride that is 'Coin For The Ferryman' and 'For The River' Rock like beasts, and even the more melodic songs like 'Silent Majority' or the Progressive 'The Betrayal (Act III)' have enough guitar to push this album firmly into Rock territory.



We still get the customary Nickelback ballads and they're good... very good. 'Song On Fire', 'After The Rain' and big power ballad 'Home' are all potential Pop hits, and 'Every Time We're Together' has more than a touch of Dallas Smith's Country Rock about it, following in the footsteps of 'This Afternoon' from 2008's 'Dark Horse'.

'Betrayal Act 1', which is tagged onto the end, is a wasted opportunity to finish this record on a high. That one blemish aside, this is a nicely balanced album featuring a great set of songs and one that can be clearly classed as a Rock album.

Mike Newdeck