CineMuerte – “Aurora Core” (2008)

Label : Raging Planet Records/Ravenheart Music

Review by Tony Cannella

From Lisbon, Portugal, CineMuerte is the band featuring vocalist Sophia Vieria (who guested on the last album by Moonspell and she also toured with them as well) and Joao Vaz. They have just issued their second release titled “Aurora Core”. The line-up for this CD is completed by Ricardo Amorim of Moonspell on guitars and Pedro Cardoso from Fever on drums. The band generated some positive feedback with their 2006 debut “Born from Ashes” and are now looking to expand on that with “Aurora Core”. The first thing that caught my eyes is the beautiful way the CD is packaged. It comes in a nice glossy digi-pack format with some cool looking cover art. When listening to the CD I was very impressed with the big vocal style of Sophia Vieira, she really delivers an inspired performance throughout “Aurora Core” and the musicianship is top notch as well. The music on the CD veers towards Gothic/progressive metal with some elements of classic rock and metal present as well. The overall vibe to the CD is dark, but the songs are very melodic and mid-tempo. Highlights include: “A Taper Light”, “Up For A Fight”, “Air” and “I’m a Fool but I Love You”. For me, the best track is “The Night of Every Day” which was written by Fernando Ribeiro of Moonspell. It’s all pretty powerful and moody stuff and a great effort from this Portuguese band.After listening to “Aurora Core” it is quite obvious why Sophia was tapped for the Moonspell “Night Eternal” album and tour. The sound of the CD is also quite good, the band chose to produce themselves but the CD was mixed and mastered in Germany by the legendary Waldemar Sorychta. Overall, a good second effort by this excellent young band.