Carmeria - Advenae Review

Grandness and pompousness are staplers of Power Metal. Two words that fit like a glove to the music heard here with Carmeria and “Advenae,” an album that lots of melody follows the tradition of Power Metal. But it’s not only tradition that fills in the album, there is a lot of modernity within it as well. If my dear fan adds some Symphonic Metal features to the album the mix will be complete and done. By the way, the album opening tells it so with the intro to the tittle track “Advenae” which begins with a grand chamber music opening that leads to a typical Symphonic Metal track. It’s from the second track that the Power Metal features appear stronger. Carmeria do a great deal of references in this album and sometimes they get a little mixed up. The strong tie that link all the album is the melodic facete of the band.

This is an album to go deciphering at each hearing. I had a view the first time I heard “Advenae” and now on the second I have another. I feel that the album has many more Symphonic Metal features that Power Metal only. However, there are times that both labelings are somewhat mixed and confused. Well, at least I confuse them myself at times. There are tracks that are typical Power Metal as “To Lead the Blind” with a strong taste of Symphonic Metal. This particular track raised my interest because I found another strong influence in Carmeria’s music which is the Progressive Metal verve. To tell you the truth, those three labelings do confuse me at times and I tend to misunderstand all of them. “Celestia,” for instance, sounds a lot with Rhapsody of Fire Progressive Metal verve with touches of chamber music. By the way, Rhapsody of Fire are an obvious reference to Carmeria’s music. it’s fair to say that Carmeria have deep roots into Rhapsody of Fire’s influences being one of the bands that the fan will immediately recognize as major influence. However, Carmeria don’t dive into Medieval as Rhapsody of Fire do. “Advenae” devolops all the melodic sense within their peers to get sometimes near a more pop drive as in “Solaris” whose chorus is very sticky. Fair enough to say that this track reminds me a lot 1980s Yes “Owner of a Lonely Heart” era.

Two things call up the fan’s attention in “Advenae.” They are the strong melodic verse Carmeria develop which leads to the second thing that is proximity with the pop verve. Both are complemetary here. When I say pop verse I don’t mean “Advenae” is a pop album. What I’m saying is that the album has a strong pop facete. “Veil of Sanctitude” tells exatly this story. That’s it.

Carmeria “Advenae” will be self-released on March 18th.

Track Listing: