Band:	My Dying Bride
Album:	Evinta
Style:	Death doom metal
Release date:	May 30, 2011
A review by:	KwonVerge

Disc I
01. In Your Dark Pavilion
02. You Are Not The One Who Loves Me
03. Of Lilies Bent With Tears
04. The Distance, Busy With Shadows
05. Of Sorry Eyes In March

Disc II
01. Vanité Triomphante
02. That Dress And Summer Skin
03. And Then You Go
04. A Hand Of Awful Rewards

Disc III [deluxe edition bonus]
01. The Music Of Flesh
02. Seven Times She Wept
03. The Burning Coast Of Regnum Italicum
04. She Heard My Body Dying
05. And All Their Joy Was Drowned

I don't think I should say anything concerning My Dying Bride, you all know who they are and what they accomplished, but most and above all you still recall the company they kept you throughout the years; that is indispensable. Yet, neither they possess the Papal infallibility nor do I grant indulgence.

Up to Songs Of Darkness, Words Of Light, even A Line Of Deathless Kings, I used to worship them, to a welcome extent of course, it always depends on the album and everything it has to say. Then, the big "surprise" came with For Lies I Sire, it wasn't even memorable, an album whose existence I nearly ignore, third class uninspired My Dying Bride just for the sake of it, nothing less, nothing more, a mediocre sculpture of what they once were. Two years later, the band itself prepared the world for something different through statements, something that was waiting for a long time to be accomplished and fulfilled, now it is awakened. Of course I'm referring to Evinta, a wannabe magnum opus of familiar and renowned My Dying Bride melodies transformed into pieces of classical/symphonic music.

The truth is, they never got through "Black God" it seems, one of their most exceptional tunes throughout the years and everything in Evinta sounds like its immature niece. Of course it's not all that bad, there are moments that send you to outer space with their immense beauty and fragile nature, in the end though there are not so many things to recall, it's like a repeated amorphous maze that flows with ultra few escalating moments that make the album reach a redeeming climax. There are many bands around that move in neo-classical/dark ambient/spoken word soundscapes doing this successfully for years and the differences between them and Evinta are inspiration, experience and purity. My Dying Bride seem to have forced themselves so much to do something "different" that they kind of failed at it, at least this is the impression they gave me. And I insist, it has its moments on every song, yet, a few moments won't make an album worth of your money. It could have been great, but...

Then, I have to admit we're talking about a mood album, you have to be in the ideal psychological condition to let it get closer to you, otherwise either you will change it or you will fall asleep before its nearly 90 minutes of duration have passed. Everything you might had thought of finding in here are present, the piano, the violin and other classical instruments partaking in the main structure, spoken word parts from Aaron Stainthorpe and even less singing that sounds quite whiny to my ears for the first time, accompanied by a soprano.

I'd recommend you give Evinta a chance to find out what words it may whisper to you, in person. As for me, I guess I'll have to go back to the albums that wrote their own history in the generally speaking atmospheric metal scene of the 90s rather than cherish deflowered melodies of a once unuttered greatness. As for My Dying Bride, I hope this ill-natured period they're running ends soon and get back with something worth of their radiance. "What is it you hope for, even though you are dying?"