While Within Temptation (with whom keyboard player and Delain founder Martijn Westerholt made his name between 1996 and 2001), took a huge step towards the mainstream in 2011 with their superb album The Unforgiving, Delain seem more reluctant to follow that path with their follow up to their excellent second, and breakthrough, album April Rain (2009).

Line up changes in the form of a new guitarist Timo Somers and bassist Otto Schimmelpennink seem to have made little difference to Delain's overall sound, and perhaps most notably it's the use of producer Jacob Hellner who's previously worked with Rammstein, that signals the main direction of travel with We Are The Others.

The band's already powerful sound has been beefed up so that, on the bombastic set opener Mother Machine you find your sub woofers have just about been sent into earth's orbit. But elsewhere that heaviness is counterbalanced by commercial, and at times almost Eurovision hooks. Strange bedfellows, admittedly¸ but that's been a key part of Delain's modus operandi since day one.

And, of course, in Charlottle Wessels they have a front woman who both looks and sounds the part.

We Are The Others picks up where April Rain left off and delivers another unbelievably consistent set. As a result it doesn't really break any new ground, and if there's a complaint it's that there's perhaps too little variation with one track merging subconsciously into the next. Don't get me wrong, there's no duffers here, but at the same time there's no real 'killer' tracks.

Which means, I think, that We Are The Others is going to go down well with fans, but it's unlikely to significantly widen the band's appeal.

****

Review by Pete Whalley