Shadowheart

Female vocalists are abundant in goth metal, but there haven't been nearly as many of them in folk-metal or black metal (certainly not as of late 2008). 's first official full-length album, , however, is a rare example of a folk-metal/symphonic black metal disc that features a female lead singer. On this 2008 recording, female singer shares the lead vocal spotlight with male singer , who also contributes rhythm guitar -- and together, they provide the type of "beauty and the beast" contrast that is common in goth metal. , however, is not goth metal per se. Rather, the music of this Finnish band is best described as a mixture of folk-metal and symphonic black metal that incorporates elements of death metal, goth metal, power metal, and progressive metal. is the "beauty" in that "beauty and the beast" juxtaposition; she provides the clean vocals, offering an ethereal, darkly angelic, goth-minded vocal style -- and the "beast" is , who fluctuates between black metal's wicked-sounding rasp and death metal's guttural "Cookie Monster" growl. Although (which contains lyrics in both English and Finnish) rocks intensely, the songs are quite melodic. get a lot of melodic and harmonic inspiration from Scandinavian folk, and some of their material brings to mind the metal/humppa fusion of (another Finnish band). Clearly, things like nuance, intricacy, and musicality are important to . is mildly inconsistent; parts of this 53-minute CD are excellent, while other parts don't work as well. But for the most part, this is a very promising debut -- and are well worth keeping an eye on. [This edition includes two bonus tracks.] ~ Alex Henderson