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High-pitched female vocals with gothic melodies in a symphonic metal mix. Heard it before? Probably! But I have never heard it from Portugal before...

The five goth-metal members in EnChanTya have been around since 2004 and recorded their first demo track in 2005 ('Moonlightning the Dreamer'), so there have been a lot of 'Ginjinha' shots and many hours of preparations and rehearsals for this first full length album. The musical influences from Nightwish, Dream Theatre, Kamelot and such bands are obvious. I love it when I get a new band to review, which erases a white spot on my personal metal map. EnChanTya strikes me with an amazement with a brazen production and a high technical instrumental competence. The singer 'Rute Fevereiro' (Everdream and Black Widows) has the whole tone scale in her chest and she delivers the keys the songs require. It seem that they have done their homework very well and they have packed the album with thirteen strong tracks that have an own distinctive character, each and every one of them.

EnChanTya is hard to put in a specific metal folder or genre. They have quite a lot of progressive metal influences and the blend with the 'regular' goth/symphonic metal is powerful. The metal-sauce is very tasteful and demands several listenings to digest. The intro song 'No Stars in the Sky' is not on my best-track list. It is too much male grunt-vocals and it ruined the song for me anyway. 'Night in Whisper' is a Nightwish kind of track, and it's a killer song! The bass intro in 'Clad in Black' is heavy as hell and the track is maybe the heaviest and the darkest track on the album. Clad in Black' is full of progressive parts and is one of the top tracks on 'Dark Rising'.

The pompous song 'Longing for You' is a song made by the manual of goth-metal, nothing extraordinary. In 'Your Tattoo' is Mr Grunt-singer is back, but the excellent guitars saves the cake and I din't choose to use the 'skip button'. The up-tempo song 'Ocean Drops' is a superb 'air-drum' track with a solid rhythmic and superfluous pace.

Title track 'Dark Rising' is a gothic heavy track full of marvelous progressive guitars and an ultra-strong vocal performance from Rute. In the calm 'Winter Dreams', which is the opposite, a butterish ballad with heaven-like tones, gentle and soft guitars and big vocal harmonies. Rute is a vocal talent and is indispensable for the bands future achievements in the tough metal business. Without her the song is just OK, but with her vocal power makes the tracks pop and smoke. 'Fear Me When You Fall' is one of my favourite tracks with big unique character. The last track is the 'old' demo song from 2005 'Moonlightning the Dreamer', which is a galloping, bombastic and technically advanced tune that concludes a very interesting debut album!

I lift my hat and congratulate Massacre Records for this solicitation. With the right guidance and support, they can go far, very far.

The band line-up: Rute Fevereiro - Vocals, Nuno "Seven" - Guitar, Bruno Prates - Guitar, Manuel Pinto - Bass and Joao Monteiro on the drums.

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