Michael Hanna’s new single, In Tribute to the Fallen, is immersive, compelling, and fearlessly unsettling. It is devotedly serious, fierce yet vulnerable in its honesty and weight.
The near three-minute epic gradually but steadily unveils its actual depths, and the cascading metal rock backdrop appropriately underlines and magnifies this progression.
Michael Hanna is a one-man band project from Northern Ireland. He plays all the guitars and bass, arranges the drums and keyboards, and is the sole singer and songwriter. After 13 years of playing, 10 of which were spent teaching guitar lessons, he finally decided to record some music of his own. Inspired by Children of Bodom, Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, Wintersun, Gary Moore, Marty Friedman, Yngwie Malmsteen, and thrash metal in general, he recorded an EP and an album that reflect his love for metal music. His songs are melodic and heavily influenced by black metal and ambient music.
Michael Hanna’s new single “In Tribute to the Fallen” is a moving and powerful song that pays tribute to those who have lost their lives. The song features soaring guitars and pummeling drums that create an anthemic quality that is sure to make it a live favorite.
The new single, a self-defined power ballad of admittedly dark origins, features soaring guitars and the striking crash of live drums. It also utilizes contrast brilliantly between these heavy moments and the more delicate ones of space and contemplation.
The musicianship is second to none, being only an instrumental performance by Hanna himself. The guitars wail and weep with a gleaming, ear-catching sheen whilst the drums pummel with a sense of grandeur. The emotional heft of the song carries it through to its finish, with an anthemic quality that is sure to make it a live favorite. It’s easy to get lost in the moment and forget that this is a one-man project, such is the level of musicianship on display.
For an upcoming artist, Michael Hanna has a very impressive range. From the please-bang-your-head metal songs to the more somber and emotive pieces like In Tribute to the Fallen, he shows great versatility and skill.
This is an artist to keep an eye on in the future, and In Tribute to the Fallen is a superb example of his talent.
