MOG Editorial Review

While she hasn't quite returned to the raw guitar rock that brought her initial fame, PJ Harvey's latest album is back and ready to turn up the volume on her latest album. There are still ballads similar to her last album, 2007's White Chalk, but by and large, guitars return along with a new arsenal of sounds and styles, with English folk flourishes and horns appearing throughout. Harvey's preference for dark, weighty lyrics are, as always, front and center, and Let England Shake chooses the trauma of World War I and its aftermath as its focuses, creating a haunting portrait of the era that paints a vivid picture of war's past and present. She's not quite the wild child she once was, but this album shows that Harvey still as some of the most exciting ideas in alt-rock today.