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4.0 out of 5 stars
Opera IX slit their own throat when they got rid of Cadaveria, June 20, 2007
If there is only one thing that is obvious after a listen to The Shadows' Madame, that is it: Opera IX might as well have disbanded when Cadaveria walked or was fired. Whereas Opera IX has since offered us tired attempts to recapture their former glory and terrible Bathory covers, Cadaveria and her new cohorts have moved forward. Everything on the first Cadaveria album reflects that much. While the songwriting is not as awesomely epic as was the case on Sacro Culto, The Shadows' Madame retains all of its musical grandiose vision, filtered through an exclusively Cadaveria worldview. Titles like Declaration Of Spiritual Independence say it all. This is the kind of music the RIAA and your nanny wish you did not know about.
However, I have to agree with those bemoaning the extreme copy protection. Easy as it was to defeat, I should not have to reboot my computer if I do something unexpected when trying to play the disc back.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Good, but not their best work, August 12, 2005
This review is from: Shadows Madame (Audio CD)
While I definitely prefer Shadow's Madame over the new Cadaveria-less Opera IX, it's not nearly as fun as Far Away From Conformity. It took me a while to get used to the mix on this album - the bass (both bass guitar and bass drums) is boosted a bit too high for my taste, and you can barely hear the keyboards, or high end of the guitar tracks.
The sound may be best described as technical death metal (reminiscent of Fear Factory and maybe early Death) that at times leans toward rock, with an odd melodic part rekindling the memories of their black metal background, although these parts unfortunately get almost lost in the mix. And of course Cadaveria on the vocals - one of her best performances to date. If you've never heard her sing, imagine if Arch Enemy's Angela Gossow had a much higher range, except Cadaveria and also does clean parts.
My favourite song on the album is Spell, closely followed by Absolute Vacuum. Cadaveria-related albums I'd mostly recommend to a newby are Opera IX's "Call of the Wood", Cadaveria's "Far Away from Conformity", and if you're into techno/industrial sound, you might dig the Dynabite project (I forget the exact spelling).
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1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good music, not so wonderful product, February 10, 2004
The reason I say it's not such a wonderful product is because it can't be played on a computer CD player, nor can it be ripped. Or maybe I just got a faulty copy... As others have said, this is a different band than Opera IX, former band of Cadaveria and Marcelo Santos (f.k.a. Flegias). The lyrics are more rebellious and less satanic. Marcelo looks like a cross-dresser in the pictures and is almost as ugly as Paul Allender. Cadaveria is a great vocalist; I don't know whether or not she's using voice distorters (it doesn't sound like she is), but that girl has some of the freakiest vocals in all metal. Way better than other 'extreme' female vocalists, even Angela Gossow. Killer Bob is great on the guitars. Good product but don't expect to put it onto your computer. The new album is even better.
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