French act Silent Opera was formed in 2007 by Olivier Sentenac (b), Romain Larregain (g) and Laure Laborde (v). They (and ‘they’ includes some new members) recorded a first album at the Laguna Records Studio, which got released as Act One in 2010. The band was able to perform live on stage with bands like Trepalium, Hypno5e or In Arkadia, and last year they recorded the sophomore full length, Reflections, at Conkrete Studio with Mobo (Eryn Non Dae, Lokurah, Minushuman, Gorod etc.).
The nine-tracker, which lasts for fifty four minutes, opens with the intro Beyond The Gate Of A Deep Slumber, which leads my thoughts to Lacrimosa during the second half of the nineties. And this orchestral approach will re-appear several times, over and over again, during the journey called Reflections. The album also combines elements from Gothic-Death Metal and so-called ‘female fronted’ Epic Symphonic Metal. Excrements of a male bovine (aka ‘bull-shit’), of course. It has to do with several aspects. One of them: the vocals. Silent Opera’s hymns are transported by both deadly grunts and an operatic female voice. So I’d like to add: so what? It happened before, and it will return more than once again; sometimes better, sometimes worse. When it comes to the compositions, getting abstraction of the vocal appearances, there’s a rather evident, un-original tradition too. Consider it a modern / modernised effectuation of traditional Goth / Prog / Sympho / Dark / Power Metal, at the one hand balancing towards the extremes of Cradle Of Filth (yet without the Black-laden aspects), at the other towards the likes of Nightwish and Dismal Euphony (the ‘legendary’ Norwegian act…)…
Indeed, Silent Opera both isn’t and is ‘just another band’ within the genre, yet at least a quasi-eccentric entity that combines elements from Nightwish, Epica, MaYan, Therion, Dismal Euphony, Theatre Of Tragedy, Lacrimosa, Tears Of Martyr, later Evol, In Silentio Noctis etc. The timeless character will certainly satisfy the eardrums of the genre-adept.