lukretion After the release of their 7th full-length album Tug of War in 2003 and a celebratory live album in 2004, Enchant took a long hiatus that lasted more than a decade. I was convinced this would be the end for the band, especially after their singer Ted Leonard joined Spock’s Beard in 2011. Yet, three years later in 2014 Enchant made a comeback with one more full-length album, The Great Divide, written and recorded by the same line-up of Tug of War. The band disappeared from the scenes once more after this record and remains inactive to date.

I do not know whether the band intended The Great Divide to be a return to their glory days of the late 1990s, when they released their best albums (1998’s Break and 2000’s Juggling 9 or Dropping 10), but if so, it’s hard to see the new LP as a resounding success. In fact, it is even difficult to find traces of Enchant’s early sound in the new album. The new material is quite light-weighted and lacks many of the progressive rock and metal stylings that had once characterized Enchant’s music. The album veers instead more decidedly towards AOR and light mainstream rock territory. These influences had always been present in Enchant’s albums, but in earlier records they had been complemented with a generous coating of progressive complexity and metallic heaviness. This is hardly the case here. One remaining trace of “progginess” on The Great Divide is the songs’ length, which frequently extends beyond the 7-minute mark. However, despite the duration, there is not a lot going on in the music in terms of intricate developments or structures. The songs are instead rooted in standard verse-chorus form with extended instrumental passages that showcase the band’s playing ability (and the solos are indeed quite good!).

The arrangements are generally simple. The guitar is often limited to providing a light, chord-based rhythmic foundation as well as soft melodic leads. The keyboards occupy a much larger portion of the soundscape compared to previous albums and often take a key role in providing melodic counterpoints to Ted Leonard’s vocal lines. These are generally weak, not because Ted is a bad singer (quite the contrary, his voice has always been a major strength for Enchant), but because they feel generic and are rarely memorable. Simply put, the songs are devoid of hooks that could elevate the already pared-down material above averageness.

Ultimately, this is how I would describe this album: neither very bad, nor very good, just simply average. Truth be told, this is also how I felt about Enchant’s previous two records, Blink of an Eye and Tug of War. Those albums, however, had slightly more redeeming qualities than The Great Divide, thanks to more interesting arrangements and a handful of songs that stood out as particularly memorable. This is not the case here, if we exclude opening song “Circles”, which is probably the most accomplished and impactful composition of the album. On that song, Ted Leonard sings “I need a new direction … I need a course correction”, which is actually an apt description of what I wished The Great Divide would do at some point during its course, though it never did.

Warthur Following Tug of War, Enchant went into a big hiatus, at least as far as studio activity was concerned, and their members pursued other interests. Frontman Ted Leonard, in particular, would find a new berth in the intervening time as the lead singer in Spock's Beard, replacing Nick D'Virgilio - but that didn't stop him and the gang getting back together to give Enchant one more go in the studio.

I wasn't so keen on the last two Enchant albums before the hiatus, and in both cases the issue largely stemmed from the departure of Paul Craddick from the band. As well as being the group's drummer, Craddick had made extensive contributions to the songwriting, and it was immediately apparent in his absence that the band's pool of creative ideas had become just a bit shallower as a result. (In particular, the Rush influence which kept creeping into their stuff disappeared, to its detriment.)

Under such circumstances, it's understandable that the band would want to step back a while and recharge their songwriting batteries before giving things another go-around. Unfortunately, in this case I don't think it quite worked. On the one hand, at least this isn't another re-run of Blink of an Eye; they're playing somewhat less heavy this time around, in a reversion back in a more art rock/melodic rock-with-prog-influences direction. Unfortunately, that isn't quite enough to invest the material with much in the way of personality. Once again, they play perfectly competently, but it's so generic that I can't retain any of it in my memory once the album stops playing.

If The Great Divide has failed to rekindle my enthusiasm for Enchant, it also seems to have failed to prompt the band themselves to spend more time, well, being Enchant. Take Ted Leonard, for example: in the intervening eight years or so since this released, he's fronted two Spock's Beard studio albums and three Pattern-Seeking Animals releases, as well as working live dates with all those projects, whereas Enchant has been inactive in the studio and, after the 2015 tour supporting this album wrapped up, seem to have only gotten together to play live at major prog festivals like Cruise To the Edge.

Might this be the end of Enchant? If that's the case, it's a bit of a lukewarm ending. On the one hand, it's not an embarrassingly poor album; on the other hand, the bonus disc on some editions which provides a potted "best of" their preceding career kinds of beats the pants off The Great Divide itself. I'm certainly more inclined to remember Enchant for albums like Blueprint of the World or Break than for unmemorable material like this.

UMUR "The Great Divide" is the 8th full-length studio album by US progressive rock/metal act Enchant. The album was released through InsideOut Music in September 2014. Enchant has been on a longer hiatus, and haven´t released a studio album since "Tug of War (2003)", although they did release the "Live at Last" live album and DVD in 2005 before disappearing completely. Especially lead vocalist Ted Leonard has spend the intermediate years in a very productive way though as he has released albums with Affector, Thought Chamber and Spock´s Beard, and also played live with Transatlantic. Drummer Sean Flanegan has played with Cynthesis and keyboard player Bill Jenkins has also been involved with Thought Chamber. Other than the mentioned musical projects, the members have also spend time starting families.

So 11 years later is it then a more mature band who has written and recorded "The Great Divide"? That´s actually both a yes and a no as Enchant has almost always appeared as a mature act with a defined sound, and while "The Great Divide" is different sounding from the last couple of releases by the band, it´s not so different that you can´t instantly recognise Enchant´s signature sound. Ted Leonard´s strong voice and skillful vocal delivery is as always in front of the band´s progressive rock/metal sound. A sound that features vocals, drums, bass, guitar, and omnipresent keyboards. Both the vocals and the instrumental parts are skillfully performed by all involved.

The material on the 8 track, 55:34 minutes long album, features clear vers/chorus structures, but most tracks also feature extented instrumental progressive sections, alternate vocal sections, and both guitar and keyboard solos, so this is still pretty complex music, which the often relatively long playing times of the tracks also provide room for. Melody and memorability are always in focus though and the technical playing is ultimately just a means to an end. Compared to the last couple of releases, "The Great Divide" isn´t as heavy and there are only a few metal traits overall on the album. Instead the keyboards are more dominant than ever, and Douglas Ott concentrate more on lead guitars, atmospheric chords progressions, and clean guitar parts, than heavy distorted riffing. So "The Great Divide" is overall more a progressive rock release rather than a progressive metal ditto.

"The Great Divide" is overall a relatively strong release with a good flow, and while the quality and memorability of the tracks decrease sligthly after the opening trio of tracks "Circles" (which is a pretty different sounding Enchant song), "Within An Inch" and the title track, the album as a whole is both well written and for the most part intriguing (although the lyrics are generally filled with simple rock clichés, and definitely could have been written with a bit more finesse). The fact that it´s both well performed and well produced too, aren´t exactly issues either and 3.5 star (70%) is therefore fully deserved. "The Great Divide" is ultimately a welcome comeback release for Enchant, although not all tracks are equally interesting and some lack a bit of edge and power (tracks like "Transparent Man" and "Life In A Shadow" apply to that description).