It ain’t of minor importance to be around for less than a decade and tour, play, record & release albums and have “created” your own music path. That’s more or less what Belladonna have achieved in almost 8 years of existence. “Shooting Dice with God” is the band’s fourth full-length release… and as they like to call it their “rock noir” keeps evolving and maturing with years.
 

Another newly formed band form Italy that’s not into power metal (that’s “weird” indeed!) but more into prog rock/metal music. The band was founded after the three original members, the bassist Enrico Sandri, (Utopia), the keyboardist Dario Di Pasquale (ZEN) & the vocalist/guitarist Riccardo Nardocci (solo) came together and decided to mix their different musical backgrounds and create some music from scratch.
 

Seduce the Heaven were formed back in 2009 by the guitarist Alex Flouros, who is also a member of Fragile Vastness. Determined to move away from the prog metal scene, he enlisted the beautiful lyrical soprano Elina Laivera and it all started. After a while they were joined by the “beast”/growler Marios Mizo, the drummer John Thomas, the bassist Chris Kollias and the guitarist Sinnik Al. At first, they released a promo CD with 5 songs and later a video for the song “Illusive Light”.
 

I honestly wasn’t expecting anything spectacular to come my way as 2012 is ending and just about all the albums have taken their way so far. Well, never say never, huh? From the moment “Invicta” came to my notice, it became the number one priority for me to hear. Due to the album’s independent nature I wasn’t aware of it till now. I guess it’s true to get it better late than never. I think it’s needless to speak about the band for it is well-known but in any case I will only say that The Enid was formed in 1974 by the keyboardist/songwriter Robert John Godfrey (ex-Barclay James Harvest).
 

Were I to guess which country this band is coming from, arbitrating by its music style I would probably choose Europe and specifically Scandinavia. I was rather surprised when I found out that The Advent Equation are hailing from Mexico. They have been around since 2008 but they only released an EP on the same year, entitled “Sounds from Within”. Having worked more on their style and especially on combining various things from the music genres they love the most, the time has finally come to present their debut album worldwide.
 

I always look out for new bands and especially indie ones that have something to offer and they need support for they do not have a major label behind them to deal with the appropriate PR. This time I happened to notice Vaudeville, a newcomer from Minneapolis. Although they’re influenced by a bunch of bands that I do not quite fancy, their music (that’s the oxymoron) pleasantly surprised me or should I say caught me off guard?
 

It seems that for every band there’s a special time when they can create and present the album that can/will mark their whole career. Vision Divine is, without any doubt, one of the best heavy/power metal bands that come from Italy. Since 1998, the year of their formation, they kept releasing very good music. In any case, Olaf Thörsen & Fabio Lione are among the top names of the Italian metal scene.
 

Sometimes it’s better to go on, evolve and burn bridges with the past in order to make it and present the new - renewed - you. That’s the case here with Icarus Witch. They had to make a choice for their future… and they did choose right. The new vocalist Christopher Shaner, the new 2nd guitarist & producer Dave Watson (Grave Desire, ex-Mantic Ritual) & the new drummer Tom Wierzbicky (Thunderfist), brought euphoria to the band’s ranks and updated the sound & the songwriting for the better.