Band:	My Enchantment
Album:	SINpHONIC
Style:	Black metal
Release date:	2005
A review by:	Lucas

01. Requiem
02. So Blood Became Wine
03. Dark Age
04. Enchanted
05. A Reflection Of Loneliness
06. Long Arm Of Death
07. Keeper
08. Between The Walls Of Insanity
09. Sinphonic
10. The Keys Of The Gate
11. Half Man, Half God
12. Machinery [bonus]

With Moonspell as the undeniable fore-runners of the Portuguese metal scene and their recent huge success, you'd expect more labels and record companies turning their heads to the shores of Portugal, looking for more talent. Apparently not, since a band such as My Enchantment is still unsigned. Nevertheless, My Enchantment doesn't allow themselves to be disencouraged by that sad fact and do things their own way, judging by the decision to release their debut "sINpHONIC" all by themselves.

The most important influences are Cradle Of Filth (roughly the Midian area) and Moonspell (to a lesser extent) with a few hints of (melodic) Death metal (vocals exclusively). The music is both vocal- and keyboard driven, although the guitars step up in front occasionally. Paulo Pereira, the deliverer of the vocals, has a nice set of styles, from Dani Filth-esque shrieks to clean vocals (which are not perfect, but rarely annoying) and growls. As I said earlier, the keyboards are also hugely influential on the sound and in my opinion; they should tone them down a bit. While they're not really going overboard with them as other bands tend to do, you're still a metal band for gods sake! Where's the riffing fury? Anyway, nobody probably agrees with me as bands that use keyboards are often quite popular, so I'll stop it now. They still throw in the occasional cool solo and lead guitar, so I'm not too bothered by it.

The most notable track is the fourth one, "Enchantment", which tells the tale of the flute player Dale that plays his hymns to God all day long, until the Devil comes to him in disguise and tricks him into playing the theme of the Devil instead. It's a good song, although it is not void of clichés (the parts of Dale, the innocent man, are clean and the voice of the Devil are of the harsh style). This song also represents the full album best in my opinion: well-executed and well-written (except for the occasional grammar mistake, but who cares about those?), but also completely according to 'the rules' of the genre and on the predictable side of things. The album doesn't hold my attention in each and every song, but the majority of the album is certainly above average.

Despite being in the scene since '99, the band has only released two demos and now this debut full-length, so the lack of an own sound is not something to hold them accountable for. I'm counting on a bit more originality for a next album though, and if they can combine that with the technical skills they already have, I'm sure they'll be able to please quite a lot of metalheads. "sINpHONIC" is already a big step in the right direction, so hopefully they can keep going forward.