Edmonton-based outfit Samandriel are one of the best examples I can think of when trying to show a fundamentally very skilled band with a completely wrong approach. They play metal and play it well. But they get an operatic singer as vocalist to perform classical style against their music rather than with it.

The effect is probably like having a classical music station on the radio while you listen to a metal CD. I can only imagine it as it is something I would never think to try. To me it is an absolute outrage when a band ruins its own material while trying to carve out a niche in the wrong place.

We all have certain tastes. I, for one, don't like pineapple on pizza, apples in potato salad or steak with mint sauce. To me that is what Samandriel is - a tasty dish ruined by an additive, which while delectable on its own, doesn't match the rest of what is on the plate.

Getting an opera singer as vocalist is not wrong in itself. Opera-trained vocalists like Sylvya NuVynska (Scarlet Sins/When Forever Dies) and others have made some very appealing statements on record in the field of metal/hard rock. But very few of them sing in classical style whilst performing modern music. The elements don't match and I have only seen one artist (Patrizia Dioguardi Pomeroy) employ a remotely similar approach and be successful or appealing in doing so. I consider Patrizia to be the exception to the rule because she has actually done it in a way that appears to make sense i.e., by finding a kind of middle-ground.

Samandriel has not found an agreeable balance and the experience of hearing their debut EP, 'Awakening', was, for me, rather painful. To me the EP is an astonishing waste of good composition, musicianship and competent studio production.

According to their Myspace page they are looking for a new singer having parted ways with vocalist Doneka Reid. I sincerely hope they get someone who sings metal/hard rock so they can do right by the appealing riffs they compose. They ruined the six tracks, each one of which sounded promising in parts on 'Awakening', and may very well do the same to any new material they might compose.

www.myspace.com/samandriel