From wonderland Italy comes yet something unforeseeable. Wonderland's aim was to create Italian rock-pop-metal. Shit, when will there be something like hymn-black-hiphop... Guys posing barechested looking more Modern Talking than metal proved to be a huge obstacle to beat. Archaic Metallurgy promises to review the stuff we get, so here we go! And to Alkemist Fanatix Europe: thanks for sending a big bunch of promos with nought to do with metal music damn it, we'll see how the promise to review everything will be deemed with this bunch.

Wonderland's music is catchy, but begins repeating during this 56 minutes. Pop raises its ugly head in song writing, some synth things and especially in vocals. Vocalist has his roots in pop music, and he doesn't try to sound metal at any point. His sugary, soft Idols-style voice simply irritates me. His English pronunciation is quite bloody bad, to tell the truth! Nothing new for an Italian band, though. There's a lot of nice instrumental passages, which might embrace some slight prog metal bits. Metal bits occur in for of double kick drumming, some guitar riffing and solos. The CD includes a good video with a plot for the worst, poppiest song on offer: 'Eternally'. 'Hell and Heaven' is a synth song. On the other side of rock-pop-metal scope lies groovy, even headbangable 'No Resurrection'. The line-up includes Vision Divine member and ex-Labyrinth drummer. Sound is very clean, and heaviest riffing and double kick drum parts pack some punch.

I thought Synthphonia Suprema would be lightest ever metal band, but Wonderland enters the same league. Finland's own Sonata Arctica can be now easily labelled under metal. Without the most sugar things, this would be an okay, light metal album. I have problem with pop music and for one thing thanks to the vocals being what they are, this Wonderland's second full-length album ain't gonna spin a lot here. But points for endeavor that many a true metal head won't stomach, believe me.

Rating: 4- (out of 10) ratings explained

Reviewed by Lane
07/04/2006 16:36