### Fantasy Opus: Beyond eternity

#### 26/11/09 || HailandKill

Holy crap. Here’s Portugeuse ‘hero’ metal that’s resplendent in yawn-inducing guitar wankery and vocals lacking any semblance of testicles. Think Rhapsody, Sonata Arctica, Heavenly, etc. You know the drill. These inglorious bastards try peddling what has already been regurgitated back in the late 90’s and to GD’s endless delight, they totally fall short of their objective. Even the musical acumen on display for “A Higher State of Mind” reeks of mediocrity. The song’s a mellow rock ballad all keyboards and cheesy hooks, which actually comes as small relief after the nauseating onslaught of the preceding speed-driven tunes. And for the love of god, HailandKill does not want to dwell on the details of those songs—they’re that bad. He’d rather sink his teeth into the new Rammstein album, whose sound may have been long patented with its inevitable heaviness and overwhelming mood, but hey, it’s sweet relief in the face of this garbage.

To make matters worse there’s a huge string of concept songs occupying this obscure 2008 release’s latter half. Aw man, there is absolutely no way HailandKill will even spare a few words describing the “Warrior’s Call” saga. The goddamn link’s down there, take a listen yerself. For the sake of lengthening this review a bit lest Lord K send him an angry email, Hailandkill finds the inner strength to bother lamenting singer Pedro Arroja’s flat vocal style and its Angra-esque pretense. The same goes for the guitars that totally plagiarize other neoclassical clones; then there’s the totally forgettable percussion. Forget the keyboards, you’ve heard them countless times before. Sure, these guys can write decent material, only much of humanity isn’t really interested to hear their decent material.

HailandKill suggests Fantasy Opus embark on a quest for a magic armoire somewhere in England that leads to this fantastical realm called Narnia. It might be in a place populated by talking animals and other species of magical creatures that these MOFO’s find a worshipful audience, for Fantasy Opus are lame ducks in today’s musical environment. The horrendous cover art, looking as if it were rendered on MS Paint, barely helps matters. Hailandkill is amazed this review actually runs more than 350 words long.

- Information
- Released: 2008
- Label: self released
- Website: Fantasy Opus MySpace
- Band
- Pedro Arrojas: vocals
- Marcos Carvalho: guitar
- Claudio Shivers: guitar
- Nelson Santaguedo: bass
- Paulo Santos: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. Mystic Messenger
- 02. The Sacred Trilogy
- 03. Path of Destiny
- 04. Higher State of Mind
- 05. Warrior’s Call Chapter 1
- 06. Warrior’s Call Chapter 2
- 07. Warrior’s Call Chapter 3
- 08. Warrior’s Call Chapter 4
- 09. Warrior’s Call Chapter 5
- 10. Warrior’s Call Chapter 6