Magnum Opus or Fallus Flatus? Only time and audience reaction will tell. I likes me some Therion, Nightwish and Dimmu Borgir, but not all on the same platter, as each loses the characteristics which makes them special. Despite the mainstream press' protests to the contrary, metalheads are musicians, and every now and then, they wish to be perceived as such. Case in point, "Abrahadabra".

Utilizing a full orchestra (even brass horns!), Dimmu has threatened to push the metal quotient to the back burner. Shagrath's vocals are cleaner (enunciated), at times a virtual voiceover atop the symphony and the opening 'Xibir' intro is devoid of the Norwegians. Good to know in this era when individual song downloads in the US exceeding a billion (yet CD sales struggle to get into the hundreds of millions) that someone still makes an album intended on being heard/listened to as an atmospheric whole. On their signature tune, there's pizzicato violin plucking instead of a guitar solo. It takes until ‘Ritualist' that the mix of orchestral elements truly melds with the heavier music. The bonus cut, Deep Purple’s 80s resurrected single, ‘Perfect Stranger’, is an odd genre defying choice. Does that resonate with anyone under thirty (outside the band)? An extra point is added for the grandiose/complexity of the construction.