Trollheart

Hereafter --- Magica --- 2007 (AFM)
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Ah yes: melodic power metal from that home of hard and heavy music … Romania? Yep, that's where these guys hail from, and I can confidently state that I have never yet listened to a Romanian band, metal or otherwise. Perhaps after this I'll regret that and wish I had sampled more music from this country whose biggest export is Count Dracula (even though he didn't exist: Vlad Dracul did though...) and revolution, but I'm not exactly inundated with records from that corner of the world, you know?

Anyhow, this is Magica's third album --- to date, they have released five --- so we're kind of coming in at the middle, which can sometimes be fun, unless you're seeing a movie in a cinema. There is, not surprisingly, little information on them, and some of the names of the bandmembers have those weird little characters that most wordprocessors don't understand or that don't translate well to the web, so we'll have to deal with that as we come across them. Right now, let's hear the music, always a good place to start.

Opener, “All waters have the colour of drowning” starts on nice classical piano intro from keysman Viorel Rainenau (at least, I assume he's male --- checking --- yes, seems to be) then the pounding drums of Cristian Barla and chugging guitars from Bogden “Bat” Costea and Emy power in, and finally the vocals of Ana Mladinovici take the song, and inevitably comparisons to the likes of Nightwish, Epica, Edenbridge et al surface, which is unfair: just because it's a power metal band fronted by a female shouldn't make it a clone of any of the above.

She has a powerful voice indeed, that sort of high, almost operatic style that tends to enunciate every word and sound very competent indeed. The song, though, is quite Epica in its style, while “Turn to stone” ramps up the speed and gets going with a real metal scorcher, great guitars from Costea (who I will from now on refer to as Bat) and Emy, thundering drums and another powerful vocal from Ana, all against a keyboard backdrop laid down by Viorel, which is how I shall refer to him. There's an element of Dio's “Don't talk to strangers” in the melody, but only a few riffs, then “Through wine” is even faster, with some great keyboard passages, and “No matter what” starts out just as fast, then slows down to crunch along.

“Entangled” starts off as if it's going to be a soft ballad, very gentle piano intro, but then Cristian's drums kick that notion away, and the song powers up, though it does slow down again almost immediately for a vocal from Ana sung almost entirely against Viorel's synth line, until the others come in and rock the song along. Nice hook in this, very commercial in its way. Probably the first song that has really grabbed me on the album. Hope there's more like this. A blast of very AOR-style keyboards announces “This is who I am”, and though the guitars from Emy and Bat are strong and fierce, it does come across as more pomp rock than power metal. Good though, with a great proggy keyboard solo backed up by some damn fine work on the guitars.

Nice violin and strings opening to “The weight of the world”, which soon takes off as another hard rocker, leaving the AOR influences behind and blasting off back to the world of melodic hard rock, a hint of Maiden in the guitar attack. Great vocal from Ana, with some sort of backing, whether they're her own multi-tracked or someone else I don't know. “Energy for the gods” introduces for the first time male vocals, which switch with Ana on the chorus, but again I have no idea who it is that's singing. Maybe one of the guitarists? Sorry, not enough information available. It's a powerful song though, racing along on Cristian's hellhammer drums, and if the gods need energy, well there's enough here to supply them for some time!

“Shallow grave” keeps up the tempo with some more great keyboard melodies driving the song, but if there's a criticism to be levelled at Magica, it's this: their music fairly much all sounds the same. We're almost at the end of the album now, and apart from the few tracks which resembled more AOR than metal, most of the songs have kind of blended into each other. Of course, this is a problem with many power metal bands: it's hard to be original in such an intrinsically unoriginal genre.

However, they do save it with the closer, a beautiful ballad played on piano and where Ana really gets to shine, utilising the softer side of her voice. The appropriately-titled “Into silence” takes Magica to different realms altogether, Ana's not thick but recognisable Romanian accent serving her well as it adds to the mystique of the song, very delicate and fragile, and an interesting, unexpected and rather satisfying way to end the album.

Well, I'm not about to rack up the rest of their discography and listen to it tonight, but nor am I prepared to consign this band to history. Yes, they're derivative, but then, you could say that about nearly every band that follows this path, with a few notable exceptions. Their proficiency and professionalism can't be faulted, and as there's nothing to say to the contrary, I must assume they --- or at least one of the band members --- wrote the songs, which while not classics are not rubbish either. Ana has a lovely, strong, powerful voice that can whisper as well as shout, as we see from the final track, and the imagery the band use, while again standard for many of these bands, is evocative and interesting.

If this is what Romania has to offer, then perhaps it's time to delve a little further into the music of this much-maligned and stereotyped country.

TRACKLISTING

1. All waters have the colour of drowning
2. Turn to stone
3. Through wine
4. No matter what
5. Entangled
6. This is who I am
7. Weight of the world
8. Energy of the gods
9. Shallow grave
10. I remember a day
11. Into silence

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