Factory of Dreams: Talking About Reality Through Fiction

Impeccable melodies, soaring vocals and sci-fi thought-provoking lyrics make up the Factory of Dreams music, a Progressive Metal project of Portuguese multi-instrumentalist Hugo Flores and Swedish singer Jessica Lehto.

Within Temptation: Line-up Changes & A New Album Coming

Compelling delicate vocals and a flawless combination of loud guitars, symphonic strings and heavy beat are the trademarks of Dutch band Within Temptation, which is presently one of the most successful Symphonic Metal bands in the world.

Within Temptation was formed in 1996, after Sharon den Adel contributed vocals to a song of guitarist Robert Westerholt’s band, The Circle. Of the forming members only Jeroen van Veen, besides Robert and Sharon remain in the band to date.

That same year, they signed with a label, and in 1997 released the album Enter, which has some great songs, like Pearls of Light and Grace. At the time, Sharon’s vocals were accompanied by Robert’s grunts, something that became less common in more recent albums.

Within Temptation’s success grew exponentially, from main stage at Dynamo Open Air in 1998, a #3 album in 2002 (Mother Earth) and a #1 in 2004 (Silent Force) in their home country, several awards, conquering the US market in 2008, and the astonishing sum of 10 million albums sold worldwide.

The band has many popular songs: Stand My Ground, The Heart of Everything, Aquarius and Memories are only a few. But it’s been 3 years since their last studio album, and though there has been much talk about a new release coming out later this year, nothing is certain. In an interview in October 2009, Sharon said that the new album would be released by that time this year, “and don’t shoot me if it’s a bit later”, but things seem to be a bit complicated for the band now.

After many line-up changes, Within Temptation just went through another one: drummer Stephen van Haetregt, who was first a studio technician for the band, did his last show on last April 29 in Antwerp. However, they posted a message on their site on April 30 about the end of their Theater Tour, adding that “after taking a very small break we're going back into the studio. After doing this tour, we really can't wait to get back on the road, hopefully we can tell you a bit more about that soon.” So, maybe a new album will be coming up by the end of 2010 or early 2011.

While we wait for their new release, here is one of the moments of this year’s tour:

Source:

Within Temptation @ Wikipedia # Interview with Sharon den Adel

ReVamp: The Siren Has Returned

Floor Jansen is back! Little over a year since After Forever broke apart, Floor Jansen has a new band, Revamp, whose album is due for May 31, 2010 in the UK and June 15, 2010 in the US. [1] [2]

Revamp’s sound is similar to that of Floor Jansen’s previous band, the classic Symphonic Metal band After Forever, maybe because besides the singer, she had the contribution of former-band mate keyboardist Joost van den Broek. Another contribution was that of producer, composer and musician Waldemar Sorychta who has worked with several bands, such as Lacuna Coil, Moonspell and Tristania.

Her working single is Head Up High, which has her traditional strong and compelling melodic vocals, a heavy beat and strings, and other great songs such as Fast Forward, Million and All Goodbyes Are Said, which were presented in a show at Bevrijdingsfestival Zwolle on May 5.

Though we are in a seemingly endless fad of vampires in pop culture worldwide, Floor Jansen explained that the band’s name is not about it: “ReVamp with the capital V is just for the looks. To me it means a new start, nothing with vampires no, I'm not into that stuff. ReVamp literally means 'Give new energy to something'. I found that very symbolic for my career. The word vamp also makes a sexy association with woman. Nothing sleazy, just sexy :-)” [3]

In another interview, Floor Jansen spoke firmly about the differences between her former and new bands: “Revamp is not After Forever II. The instrumental and vocal versatility have remained diverse, but Revamp is heavier, less orchestral. I often change my opera voice with my rock voice, and there is more emphasis on guitars and less on the keys. Revamp is more direct, more Soilwork direction.” [4]

Revamp’s line-up is completed with drummer Matthias Landes (Dark Fortress), bassist Jaap Melman (Dreadlock Pussy, Pendejo), guitarists Jord Otto and Arjan Rijnen (Pendejo) and keyboardist Ruben Wijga (Insomnia). The band is scheduled to do a series of shows in the next few months.

Check the videos below to see Floor Jansen singing her soul out with Revamp:

Revamp's Official site

Tiarra: Light & Darkness from the Land of Dracula

Tiarra is a Romanian band from Bucharest, whose sound is both potent and melodious. Formerly a Black Metal band, their sound now is more Progressive and Gothic Metal.

They have a unique combination of Metal instruments and strings, due to the playing of their cellist Iulia, and violinist Diana. Also, all the musicians have academic training on classical music, which makes their sound very rich and fascinating.

Their main vocalist, Anda, has a delicate voice, which contrasts as light to darkness with the tenor vocals of Alex (Indianu). The other members who complete their special line-up are keyboardist Johann, guitarist Tudor, bassist Adi and drummer Gabi.

Tiarra underwent several line-up changes since their formation in 2004. The following year they released their first CD with 6 songs, which was called Drama Per Musica, including the excellent songs To the End of the Light and Dying Soul.

It took them 3 years to release their second album, Post Scriptum, in 2008. In an interview, Alex explained what happened then: “Mainly it was the changes in our line-up. We took the time of finding our identity along with a sound we can call our own. We are still working on that, but I think we have the best possible formula member-wise.

“Another reason is that both albums were recorded with our own resources, which I have to admit are very limited. Even though Omvina, the label that produced "Post Scriptum" helped a lot by taking care of mastering, production and world-wide distribution, it still took us a long while to do the actual recordings, which were already finished by the time the label approached us.” [1]

Tiarra is currently doing some shows in their homeland, and intends to take their act to other European countries, but in order to do that there some obstacles to overcome, as Alex comments: “If in the rest of Europe to make money as a young metal band is quite hard, in Romania it actually is impossible. Here, when you draw the line you discover that you actually have to pay to do music.

“Even if we have five years of existence as a band, we still are at the beginning of our career. If you add this to the fact that Romania is a grey area on most of the strong booking agencies' maps you realize that it is hard for us to have such opportunities.

“To do a tour on our own, without being invited and supported by some good promoters is virtually impossible. But we hope this will change in time we succeed in making a name for ourselves. We will most definitely welcome any opportunity to come and perform anywhere around Europe and we would be honored to accept any such invitation.”

Let’s root for them!

Below are two live videos:

Source: http://www.tiarra.ro/biografie.php

Tiarra's Official Site # MySpace Profile

Charlemagne: 88-year-old Christopher Lee’s Metal Project

That Sir Christopher Lee, the British 88-year-old actor, is a living legend is beyond question. In his long career he has played some of pop culture’s most iconic characters: Dracula, Saruman and Count Dooku in Star Wars.

His voice is unique, vibrant, strong and ominous, and he has provided the voice for several games like Lord of The Rings: Battle For Middle Earth, Kingdom Hearts, and animations such as Valhalla, The Last Unicorn, The Corpse Bride, Star Wars: The Clone Wars.

Years ago he has already contributed with the bands Rhapsody (Magic of the Wizard’s Dream) and Manowar, and Inner Terrestrials, now, he has a new Symphonic Metal project, Charlemagne, in which he, accompanied by a group of talented musicians and a presenter, tells the story of one of the world’s most important historical figures.

In an interview on You Tube, Sir Christopher Lee says that: “It's fascinating for me, that at this stage of my life, I suddenly find that people are beginning to look upon me as a Metal singer... And judging... from the huge number of hits on the internet… everybody is very excited about this, I certainly am, but it's very unexpected."

"So to my surprise and indeed great pleasure, I suddenly found that there seems to be another string to my bow, and now we shall wait and see.”

Sir Christopher Lee says that he descends from Charlemagne through his mother’s family Carandini, but that’s just a coincidence and not the reason he has decided to start this project.

As far as what is already on the internet, the songs are powerful and well done, and the work is reminiscent of another music & storytelling album, the Rick Wakeman’s classic King Arthur & The Knights of The Roundtable. As for Sir Christopher Lee’s act, he’s amazing like always, with his singular voice and his decades of theatrical experience.

If you like Symphonic Metal bands like Leaves’ Eyes, Battlelore, Blind Guardian and others that mix legends from the past and great heavy melodious sounds, check it out.

For the record, Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne was a revolutionary king. He ruled the region that now comprises Germany, France, North of Spain, Belgium and Netherlands, for 46 years, between 768 and 814CE.

He had a great importance in the history of Europe, not only because he unified several regions, but because he tried to bring back some of the Ancient wisdom, by recovering Greek and Roman texts, he promoted the exchange of knowledge between cultures, scholars from all over Europe went to work for him, and at a time when most noblemen were illiterate, he himself studied and had his children and grandchildren study as well. His greatest frustration was that he never actually learned how to write.

Because of all that, the period of his reign is known as Caroligian Renaissance.

To know more about Christopher Lee’s project, Charlemagne, watch these videos, one with an excerpt from the album and the other of his interview, and visit the MySpace profile.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Lee

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne

http://www.myspace.com/charlemagnemusical

Echoterra: Progressive Melodies

Echoterra is a great Symphonic Metal band formed by Avian’s guitarist Yan Leviathan and Jonah W in 2008, in the US.

Their music has the beats and melodies of other female-fronted bands like Nightwish and Imperia, but with a Progressive Metal twist, and both the former vocalist Suvi Virtanen and the new one Melissa Ferlaak have beautiful, if not very potent, voices.

They have only one album, The Law of One, and one EP, In Your Eyes, released to date, but they have announced a new release by early 2011.

In a recent interview, Leviathan talked about his reasons for forming Echoterra. He said that:

“I enjoy many kinds of music and I wanted a different outlet for the songs that I had written that didn’t quite fit Avian’s style. Jonah W and I are very good friends and I think that we make a very good writing team and the debut Echoterra CD is a good reflection of that.

“Unlike Avian where I write all of the music and the majority of the lyrics, Jonah composes the symphonic versions of the songs and I then re-arrange them a bit and write the guitar, bass and drum parts. It also allows me to write lyrics that I would not write for Avian; in fact, I make a conscience effort to write from a female’s point of view since we have a female singer.”

Talking about what moves him to make music, he said:

“My goal is for people to really listen to the music and get inspired to go out and find the truth; unfortunately, most people rely on the media and schools to tell/teach them the truth but in fact they are just being programmed with lies.”

Below our usual selection of videos and links. Enjoy!

http://www.stormbringer.at/interviews.php?id=540&lang=en

http://www.myspace.com/echoterra

Goth Classical Music: Franz Liszt

Some of the main successful Symphonic Metal bands of later years are deeply influenced by classical music, and besides the undeniable technical quality and complexity of it; there are some compositions that are darkly fascinating, and I don't mean those from some Horror movie soundtrack.

For this reason, this is the first of a series of articles on classical music composers, who have influenced many Goth Metal bands.

So let's start with the Hungarian genius Franz Liszt, who was a prodigy child, the first showbiz international star, a controversial and admirable personality. Born in 1811, in Hungary, dead in 1886, in Bayreuth, Franz Liszt lived a long and productive life. With both his grandfather and his father as musicians, he started playing for the Esterhazy family, owner of the land in which his family lived, when he was 9 years old.

At age 12, Liszt was already composing and playing concerts, and from that he progressed in a vertiginous speed, through becoming a virtuose concert pianist, a much requested tutor, a versatile and daring composer, and a captivating conductor.

He was considered by his contemporaries as the most technically advanced pianist of his time (and maybe of all time), which his compositions of the period known as Years of Pilgrimage can confirm. The Marche Funebre is particularly interesting for us, Metal fans, as it has both the raw power and the introspective melody we like.

His playing was described as having "abandonment, a liberated feeling, but even when it becomes impetuous and energetic in his fortissimo, it is still without harshness and dryness. [...]

"[He] draws from the piano tones that are purer, mellower and stronger than anyone has been able to do; his touch has an indescribable charm. [...] He is the enemy of affected, stilted, contorted expressions.

"Most of all, he wants truth in musical sentiment, and so he makes a psychological study of his emotions to convey them as they are. Thus, a strong expression is often followed by a sense of fatigue and dejection, a kind of coldness, because this is the way nature works."

His performances were particularly known for being intense and emotional. Franz Liszt not simply played but expressed the emotions he was trying to convey through it in his face, which showed anger, sadness, joy, according to the melody and in the intensity of his playing, which could become quite energic.

His main influences were Beethoven, the idol of his childhood, Paganini, the eccentric violin master, who had a Jimi Hendrix-like impact on the musicians of his time, Berlioz, who pushed the limits of orchestra concerts, once playing with 1000 musicians and Chopin, whose moody and seemingly simple compositions fascinated Liszt.

Though some purists may cringe at my comparing classical composers with a Rock stars, this is inevitable. Liszt was probably the first international celebrity, who had a rabid fanbase of screaming, fainting, hysterical women chasing him, collecting his cigar stubs, tearing at his clothes, wearing locks of his hair in bracelets.

Interesting that Liszt would have female adulation even in his late years, regardless of him being in his 70's.

This period, which began in 1842, was nicknamed Lisztomania, and affected not only Paris, where he lived at the time or even France, but most of the countries where he toured in Europe.

But Liszt's musical prowess and fame are far from being his only qualifications. His generosity towards fellow musicians and his dedication to charity were other important traits.

Richard Wagner, Hector Berlioz, Camille Saint-Saëns, Edvard Gried and Alexander Borodin were only a few of the many composers he helped in all ways, including financially. And if you think that charity concerts are a recent trend, know that Liszt was one of the most dedicated musicians to humanitarian causes.

He played numerous concerts to raise money for charities, contributed to the fund that helped the victims of the Hamburg fire of 1842, to the raising of the Beethoven statue at Bonn, the building of the Cologne Cathedral, and others.

Always unpredictable, he took minor orders in 1865, becoming Abbot. In the next few years, he would compose many sacred choral works, but would never lose his nerve in challenging the status quo. Though a Catholic and abbot, he experimented with some “devil’s chords” or some sounds that the Catholic Church had forbidden to be used, in his compositions Dante Sonata, Csardas Macabres, among others.

After his years traveling the Northern Hemisphere, he finally settled down in Weimar, with his unofficial wife Princess Carolyne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, who he never could formally marry, then years later, as an abbot, he spent periods of the year among Rome, Weimar and Budapest, despite his old age.

Probably because of several losses and worries he had in his later years, as the death of his son and daughter, and of many friends, the problems caused by his daughter Cosima betraying her husband with Richard Wagner, the struggle he faced to promote his innovative music and that of others, he became increasingly introspective and even depressive, and his thoughts on death and despair can often be found in his later works. He told his biographer, Lina Ramann that he carried “a deep sadness of the heart which must now and then break out in sound.”

A couple of interesting quotes by Franz Liszt:

“Life is only a long and bitter suicide, and faith alone can transform this suicide into a sacrifice.”

“Real men are sadly lacking in this world, for when they are put to the test they prove worthless.”

Now that you know about the man, here are some of his music. For more information, visit the links at the bottom of the post.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritone

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_works_of_Franz_Liszt

Aesma Daeva: Ethereal Voice & Angry Guitars

Aesma Daeva is an American Symphonic Metal band formed in 1998, whose present members are Lori Lewis, Chriss Quinn, John Prassas and Tim Klatt. Their sound has some progressive melodies, and Lori's vocals are quite impressive.

Below I've selected a couple of videos, including an amazing rendering of a Mozart Opera. For more information visit their site and myspace profile.




More info: Official Site | Myspace Profile | Myspace Profile of Lori Lewis

Demether: Folk Metal from Serbia

Demether is a Folk / Goth Metal band from Serbia, formed in 2002, their style is on the lines of Nightwish. They have released only 2 albuns to date, both very good. Their sound is a mix of operatic vocals, fast Heavy Metal-guitars, sometimes Baroque and Medieval melodies, loud drums, and the predictable male guttural vocals here and there.

Below is a couple of videos of theirs. Enjoy!

More info: Myspace

Delain: Soft Voice & Loud Guitars

Delain is a Dutch Symphonic Metal band, which has been around since 2002, and is a project from former-Within Temptation's keyboardist Martijn Westerholt. Earlier this year, they released the album April Rain, which is even better than their previous one, Lucidity. Comparisons with Westerholt's old band are inevitable, as Delain has the same style, still to underrate his new band would be unfair, as the songs are well-worked and powerful.

In an interview, Martijn Westerholt commented about Delain’s latest release that he “didn’t had any doubts about it whatsoever because we wrote our music already anyway and I know the capabilities of the band. For me it was only an improvement in the way of working, we know the weaknesses and strong points of all band members.

“I’m really satisfied with the response so far, also with the press, I think our lowest rate I saw was a 6, and it was really an exception. The most is really well, so I’m really satisfied for that.”

When comparing working with guest musicians, which he did in the first Delain album Lucidity and working with band members, Westerholt said: “The good thing about working with guest musicians is that you get a very fresh approach and it’s also very surprising which is kind of cool, but the difference with working with band members is that you know exactly everybody’s specialty, everybody’s strong points.

“Therefore you can really plan it; you can use everybody’s good points and make the best album you can get. It’s easier. In the end the process went so fast that we barely had time to think about guests. It was really an easy and satisfying process also for the band members of course because they had time and space to give inputs.” [1]

Charlotte Wessels explained why guest musicians were used in Delain’s first album: “Well, when we started recording for Lucidity, Martijn was still struggling with some health issues. [note: Martijn left Within Temptation because of health problems] The choice for a guest musician project was a logical one back then because of course it’s interesting to work with a lot of people, but also because Martijn’s health was not good enough to tour and play gigs like a regular band.

“When the album was released we were so enthusiastic about it, and besides that Martijn was feeling a lot better, so the idea of having a band to tour with became a lot more realistic. We really hit the jackpot with the band members we found back then.

“When we started recording for our second album "April Rain," it was only logical that it would be just as much their album as it would be Martijn’s album and mine. They played a prominent role in recording and also in writing some songs on the album.” [2]

Watch below two videos from the April Rain album, and find out more about Delain on their official site.

More info: Official Site

Leaves' Eyes New Album: Njord

Leaves' Eyes' new release Njord is quite good, a great collection of Symphonic Metal songs. The vocalist, Liv Kristine has good vocals in it, and the songs are both melodic and powerful.

In a recent interview, vocalist Liv Kristine said that "Njord has a power to it that even is more intense than any previous production I've been part of. Technically, we constantly have new ideas and aims. We have our own studio and therefore we have the opportunity to specialize in technical tasks concerning album and DVD productions. Njord has even a more bombastic but delicate sound than Vinland Saga, because techniques allow it." [1]

On another one, she expressed her pleasure with their achievements in Njord: "I am absolutely happy and satisfied with the album. We've never worked this hard before with a production, but we've reached our goal. I would even say, we even went further than we thought was possible, technically seen.

"It has always been important to me that our sound and art is authentic, i.e. that you can hear from the very first tunes that this is Leaves' Eyes! We also want that our audience really get the feeling of being on a wonderful journey. I feel that our music needs a special well-written and interesting concept which is just as important as the sound, and "Njord" gives you all this." [2]

Below I've selected two videos of my favorite songs of the album: Through Our Veins (live in 2008) and Njord.

Leaves' Eyes Official Site