Review: The Gems – Year of the Snake

Napalm Records (March 13^th, 2026)

Reviewer – Jason Hopper

Having risen from the ashes of their group departure from Thundermother, The Gems are back with their sophomore release, ‘Year of the Snake‘. Their debut album ‘Pheonix‘ (review here) was terrific and adhered close to the sound of their former band. Based on the tracks that have been released thus far, the album certainly sounded promising.

All five singles released are great and representative of what one can expect from the album.  Since they are out there in the world, I won’t spend too much time discussing them. ‘Live and Let Go’, ‘Firebird’ and the title track are all representative of what came before and what I would expect to hear from the group. Solid grooves but nothing surprising. ‘Hot Bait’ is quite different.  A bit of ZZ Top blues mixed with a boogie woogie swagger fits like a glove sonically.

Final new track, Gravity’, incorporates another style foreign to the band: Pop Rock. A groove and chorus that’s light, fun, and infectious. The band knew the assignment when they worked out the melody and wrote the aspirational lyrics to match. While it was my favorite of the five that had been released, I was aware the track would potentially be an outlier.

While it is indeed unique, in that no other track sounds like it on the album, I was pleased to find out that several tracks have a distinctness to them. The band pulls from various inspirations to create an album that takes you on a journey, leading the listener to places one would not anticipate.

What is great about these slightly different directions is the band never loses a sound that they can call their own. ‘Forgive and Forget’ goes for a power ballad aesthetic, to great effect. They go for a high throttle metal track with closer ‘Happy Water’, a blast to play on maximum volume while banging your head.

A special shoutout to ‘Go Along To Get Along’, my favorite melody amongst some fantastic melodies.  This mid-tempo showcases guitarist Mona Lindgren strumming individual notes that are immediately muted then re-strummed, making for a choppy melody that’s pointed and intense.  You know the face guitarists make when they play a riff that sounds grungy and heavy?  I guarantee you she makes that face when playing this song.

There are a few tracks that are a bit on the weak side in the second half. ‘Math Ain’t Mathing’, ‘Stars’, and ‘Buckle Up’ are uneventful. They feel like album fillers. I would bet money these songs will not be making it into their live sets. With that said, their omission still leaves the album with ten solid tracks.

A full listen through and you get the sense the band is in a better place mentally. The sense of betrayal and jadedness has given way to feelings of euphoria and triumph, as reflected in the lyrics to tracks like ‘Gravity’, Live and Let Go’, and ‘Firebird’.

Musically they sound like they are having a blast and cutting loose. The tunes are a bit more diverse, incorporating pop, blues, and metal into varying tracks. The result is an album that surpasses the debut and feels like a band that has found its sound, stepping out of the shadow of their former band and gelling as a new musical identity. This is a marvelous release that needs to be sought out by everyone. 

Tracklisting:

1. Walls (Intro)
2. Year of The Snake
3. Gravity
4. Diamond In The Rough
5. Live and Let Go
6. Clout Chaser
7. Hot Bait
8. Forgive and Forget
9. Go Along To Get Along
10. Math Ain’t Mathing
11. Firebird
12. Stars
13. Buckle Up
14. Happy Water

Line-up:

Guernica Mancini – Vocals
Emlee Johansson – Drums
Mona Lindgren – Guitar, Bass

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