TUG OF WAR

ENCHANT paints their story on a rock 'n' roll canvas, which happens to be on the CD cover of their spanking new release "Tug Of War". If you look closely, you will notice covers of several of their albums within the picture. The title and the cover image are an intimation of the stories inside.

The title track is the one song that caught my attention in an eye popping way. The perspective of an addict and alcoholic and the person watching the one in denial of the disease that lies, gets a hard look in very clear-cut and honest way. No one knows better than this writer does, as I have lived the lie and come out the other side to tell the tale. Looking into the mirror of life and seeing the struggle from both sides of your personality, the good and evil and the endless tugging back and forth can be a trying experience. I find it interesting that there are two different people in the picture. The key is to not let what is on the other side of the mirror suck you in, because what is real is what is standing in front of the reflection.or is it? I get the message of the songs, the cover image and the entire premise of this album. The fact that the music is killer helps, too.

This band keeps getting better and better. The influence of the classic progressive- rockers KANSAS is evident, particularly in the vocal department with Ted Leonard. This front man has panache to spare and the pipes to back it up. If the band is in the middle of a driving rocker complete with bobbing and hooking bass lines, pounding rhythmic drums, fiery guitar lines that pierce your soul and keyboards that 'enchant' you, Leonard has no trouble changing the inflection of his voice to fit the mood provided. That is the one key element that makes this whole thing work for ENCHANT. If you do not have a lead vocalist that expresses the emotion and meaning of each song your ship is lost at sea. Make no mistake; this ship knows exactly where it is going.

They have topped themselves yet again with an extraordinary album by recording 10 grand progressive rock/metal tracks that call to you repeatedly; now that is the kind of CD that is worth giving heavy rotation in your stereo.

Rating: 4.5/5

Aahh, art rock. The short step afar the prog drawing closer to radio friendly material. The rock bands running from the herd towards prog are few these days. We have to get back to Rush in the 90's to finally find something solid. Well, it's about time somebody did something. And I am wrong or the North Americans really dominates this category? Rush, Styx, Kansas and now Enchant.

Boy this feels fresh and revigorating! Feels like a facial by Clinique!

I'm really happy to get a piece of America with this record. The sound is North American made by the same people for North Americans. This rocks more than it progs, but art rockers are so far away in our memories, don't you think? Rush bowed their heads a couple of albums ago and the future's dark for that category. And that kind of lighter music really shakes you up, makes you wanna drive and SING OUT LOUD the choruses. Oh man, feels good to finally hear a chorus once in a while! After the complexity of many phases of progressive rock, the refreshing, cooling attitude of Enchant is what I needed.

Enchant is a cute little band without the pretention of America's most wanted: Dream Theater. The bluff is out, they don't copy anything...they just rock. And a good bravo to the keyboard dude who pops up many forgotten keyboard sounds.

Amateurs of Rush 90's albums like Test for Echo or Roll the Bones and their side projects (Victor or My Favorite Headache) should give attention to this record.

Aahh, art rock...the only category to find a prog song actually ending with a fade out.

Enchant: efficient and humble rocking band with bite.

Enchanting as awaited ...

ENCHANT belongs to my favourite bands of the heavier part of the Progressive Rock genre. The band produced excellent albums over all long period with songs full of great guitar riffs and solos. The impressive vocals of Ted Leonard are a trademark of the sound for sure and the keyboards are sometimes providing a symphonic touch. They are meandering purposefully between the neo prog, art rock and prog metal interfaces and therefore are hard to classify. 'Tug Of War' from 2003 is an album which counts to their best ones.

The song writing skills are another great plus which define their music new with every album without changing the style very much. Beautiful is a really beautiful emotional ballad for example. There is no lacking song whereas Comatose is convincing me very much and the album is rounded up with a live version of Below zero - the opener of their second album 'Wounded'.

A recommended band - 4 stars really.

Nice to see the band thank former drummer Paul Craddick in the liner notes. I still prefer their early albums to these later ones. Actually my "Tug Of War" disc has a bonus song which is a live version of "Below Zero" which was the first song on the "Wounded" record (their second album). I mention that because that song really made me feel good, I love that period of the band. A new keyboard player has been added to the band for this record in Bill Jenkins. Doug Ott played the keys along with his guitar on the previous album "Blink Of An Eye".

"Sinking Sand" opens with pounding drums and grinding guitar that are contrasted throughout with the verses that have piano and vocals but no guitar (except the final verse). "Tug Of War" features lyrics about the war we fight within ourselves and being our own worst enemy at times.The album cover front and back demonstrates this well. The music is heavy RUSH-like (2112) to open but never gets that heavy again. It becomes an uptempo track with organ and some great guitar before 4 minutes. Violin and some good bass follow. "Hold The Wind" has some prominant drumming early. A really good section 2 1/2 minutes in with TOOL-like drumming and synths. Bass joins the fun and a killer guitar solo 4 minutes in. "Beautiful" is ballad-like with piano and synths. Nice vocals.

"Queen Of The Informed" is a good song with a heavy intro. The drums,vocals and bass shine. The intro is reprised at the end of the song. "Living In A Movie" is a feel good song. ENCHANT are so good at making these types of tunes. "Long Way Down" is another catchy, melodic song. Good harmonies and some killer guitar 3 minutes in. I like some parts of this song a lot. "See No Evil" is lyrically about how society has blurred the lines between right and wrong. It sounds beautiful a minute in. A tasteful guitar solo 4 minutes in with a great ending. "Progtology" is my favourite track. An instrumental with some mellotron and even some bass solos ! This is incredible ! "Comatose" is the final song, and it's very ballad-like opening with piano. Vocals join in followed by some crying guitar. A full sound 3 minutes in including an extended guitar solo.

3.5 stars. This one keeps growing on me but there are too many bland moments to go along with the excellent ones. Still this is above average.

This is the last effort by Enchant so far and somehow it's not really unlogical that they didn't come up with a successor. This album is a very good one but on the downside I believe there's not much new under the sun and I'm afraid they started to run out of inspiration at this point. Of course there can be other (personal) reasons why they haven't produced anything lately but I wouldn't be surprised if my statement appears to be true.

This album is to me one with a strong beginning and a terrific ending but the middle part is what I was talking about: nice songs but not significant at all. If you compare these songs with their two previous albums (Juggling and Blink) I think they are in a bit of a downfall here. But I also want to talk about the strong aspects. Sinking sand is a great opener, a song that could have been on their strongest album: Juggling 9 or dropping 10. Tug of War is ok too but a bit less. Next six songs I've already mentioned but I must add that Beautiful and Living in a movie are at least original.

The last two tracks (Below Zero is not on my version) are absolutely tremendous though Progtology is much of the same compared to Prognosis on Blink of an eye. Comatose is a superb ballad, really one of their very best efforts ever.

So I hope Enchant will take some courage out of that last track and realize they are still a band with great potential and they will always be a huge favourite of mine. 4 stars for Tug of war.

Tug of War is the sixth ( not counting Time Lost) studio album from american soft progressive metal band Enchant. I wasn´t too content with their last album Blink of an Eye which I found very average and signalled that Enchant had lost their will to experiment with their sound. Tug of War is more of the same. It would be wrong to say that this is below average music because it´s definitely made with real skill. I just feel the songs lack bite. It´s pretty obvious that Enchant draw their influences from bands that I don´t normally consider very hard or heavy. In the booklet main composer Douglas A. Ott sites bands like Journey and Kansas as some of his influences and quite frankly those two bands are not what I think about when I say bite. Enchant have used their formula too many times and their music has ended up being good but not that exciting or innovative. They lack exactly what I like about a band like Dream Theater which is the influence from really heavy bands like Slayer and Pantera.

The music is soft power chord driven progressive metal with melodic synth lines as support. Ted Leonard´s voice is the most special thing about Enchant´s music and he does have a really beautiful voice even though he almost sounds too nice at times. Songs like Sinking Sand, Queen Of The Informed, Living In A Movie and the instrumental Progtology are good songs in my opinion while the rest are pretty average. A song like Beautiful is too cheesy for me though and definitely touches soft rock territory which is a mortal sin in my book.

The musicianship is as always good. New keyboardist Bill Jenkins is a pleasant addition to Enchant even though he doesn´t bring anything new. I guess it doesn´t really matter who´s playing what in Echant as long as Douglas A. Ott and Ted Leonard are in control of things.

The production is Enchant´s most bass heavy production to date and you can really hear Ed Platt´s many great bass lines very clearly. It´s a real treat if you love the sound of a bass.

Tug of War is not my favorite Enchant album but occasionally I take it out and listen to it. This is a sure 3 star album for me. Good but not excellent. I´ll recommend that you get Break or Juggling 9 or Dropping 10 instead. Enchant were at the top of their game with those two albums.

Enchant are back with their seventh album, and yet again show that when it comes to prog rock with the heavy use of guitar they are one of the best around. When I saw them support Spock's Beard at the Astoria I was extremely impressed, and having followed their career with interest since reviewing their debut album some eleven years ago I was pleased to be able to listen to the new album. This is prog rock that also has a foot firmly in the melodic rock camp, with guitarist Doug Ott providing the foundation for the band while Ted Leonard has much more in common with rock frontmen than most prog singers.

The result is an album that is packed full of melodies and hooks, yet also has room for time changes and dramatic shifts in musical direction. It opens with "Sinking Sand", a song that contains just what every melodic rock fans wants in great harmonies, strong tunes and arrangements and enough space and drama for all. This standard is carried all of the way through the album which closes with the longest number, "Comatose". This starts off gently enough with just Ted and piano but ever so slowly and gradually the tension builds, and the rest of the band come in. The passion keeps building and there is the feeling of a full on band just straining to be released.

One of the joys of Enchant is that they are so easy to listen to and enjoy, even on first hearing. Yet another strong album to add to their canon.

Originally appeared in Feedback #78, April 2004

Enchant's last album to date from 2003 - Tug of war brings nothing new in their sound, is constructed on same coordonates as their previous works, more like their last 2-3 albums. While far from bad, Tug of war is little less intresting then let's say their first one and Blink of an eye or Juggling 9. The arrangements are as always tight and guitar has an important role here, pounding drums, great vocal lines from Leonard, crunchy bass and some sporadicaly but very well integrated in this context are the keyboards like on top notch instrumental Progtology - this pieces simply kick ass among their best tunes in the whole career. Another highlight is the opening tracl Sinking sand, typical Enchant in sound but so well wriiten with catchy parts coming from Dougg Ott. All in all this as the same calibre as Break, not as inventive as A blue print of the world or Juggling 9 my fav from them, but still pretty much ok with some great moments in parts. Definetly good and for that 3 stars rounded up half a star for the mentioned two pieces who really smoke.

Tug of War would be the last Enchant studio effort before a fairly long hiatus, which would be broken over a decade later by The Great Divide. It's not that they outright split or everything - it's just that they stopped making studio albums, despite having kept up a fairly frequent output over the preceding decade.

Perhaps it was high time for a break; I'd thought the album prior to this, Blink of an Eye, was rather forgettable, in part because the departure of original drummer Paul Craddick meant that the band's pool of songwriters suddenly got shallower, with Douglas Ott and Ted Leonard taking on all the songwriting duties when previously they had been shared between more hands, leading to an album with a rather samey sound.

This time around, other hands contribute more - Ed Platt has some credits, as does new keyboardist Bill Jenkins - but Leonard and Ott still shoulder most of the burden, and it feels like the creative well is running dry here. Whilst it has a few more prog flourishes than Blink of an Eye did, this like that album is often painfully generic at some points, and once again I find myself missing the Rush influences which were more evident on their run of albums from Blueprint of the world to Juggling 9 Or Dropping 10.

Just as Blink of an Eye felt like a rehash of Juggling 9 Or Dropping 10, with just a bit less sonic diversity, so too does Tug of War feel like a rote rehash of Blink of an Eye - again, it's pleasant, but it's not memorable. Maybe the band's earlier works had their shakier aspects, but they at least had more personality than this. Taking a good long break to recharge those creative batteries might be just what the doctor ordered.