Glasya – Fear

Glasya
Fear
Label: Scarlet Records
Out: October 24^th, 2025
Playing time: 01:08:44

After three years, the Portuguese Symphonic Metal band Glasya is back with their third album ‘Fear’. The predecessor ‘Attarghan’ had light but also shadows, at least for my taste. Musically, the band from the capital of Portugal was able to convince me, but the listening pleasure was spoilt by many pathetic narrative sections. Like its predecessor, the current album is a concept album. It tells the story of a woman who is confronted with her fears but finds the courage to overcome them. Will a better balance between music and narrative be found this time?

The album starts with the title track ‘Fear’. You can hear the protagonist running and panting. But only briefly. Then you hear typical Symphonic Metal, or rather Cinematic Metal, with keyboards and choruses. The powerful vocals of Eduarda Soeiro are what convinced me on the previous album. Fernando Ribeiro (Moonspell) probably contributes the growls and male vocals. The sound doesn’t change much on ‘Hunt Of The Haunted’ either. There’s plenty of orchestral bombast to be heard. And here we have it again, the narrative voice. At the beginning of ‘In Debris’, the voice sounds very, very fearful. But then it powers on mercilessly. The singer soars into the high soprano range. Once again, Eduarda’s vocals are contrasted by growls. Later on, there are also frequent spoken interludes at the beginning of the songs, followed by a lot of epics. The best thing in my opinion, however, is Eduarda’s vocals. She mostly sings in the mid-range, but, as already heard, she doesn’t shy away from the high notes either. Quiet and contemplative passages are also inserted time and again. This can be heard in ‘Stuck In A Cobweb’, ‘In A Flooding Room’, ‘The Confrontation’ and ‘The Ultimate Challenge’, among others. On the anthemic ‘Glimpse Of Memory’, the singer once again has a well-known vocal partner in Michele Guaitoli (Vision Of Atlantis). On ‘Rising Wildfire’, Sara Leitão from the Portuguese Melodic Death Metal band Dark Oath contributes some evil growls. As a result, it sounds a lot harsher here than on other songs on this album. There is a real Beauty and the (female) Beast atmosphere. In contrast, Eduarda has a tenor vocal partner in Filipe de Moura on ‘Rescue’. For me, this is one of the best songs on the album. After apparently waking up in a hospital room on the instrumental ‘Overcoming’, Edurda Soeiro sings the final song ‘No Teu Abrigo’ (English ‘In Your Shelter’) in her mother tongue. An optimistic sounding ending.

Firstly, it can be said that there are also a lot of spoken words on ‘Fear’, which somehow continue the story. But far less pathetically than on its predecessor. This makes the album much more enjoyable to listen to. But Glasya have once again produced a concept album. So, logically, there is no one hundred per cent musical enjoyment. Nevertheless, I like it better than ‘Attarghan’.

Glasya – Fear ft. Fernando Ribeiro (Moonspell): https://youtu.be/7gZO6bfBqjU?si=nIQxu8xR_6zP4uCm

Lineup:

Eduarda Soeiro – Vocals
Davon Van Dave – Keyboards
Hugo Esteves – Guitar
Bruno Prates – Guitar
Ivan Santos – Bass
Pedro Correia – Drums

Track list:

• Fear
• Hunt Of The Haunted
• In Debris
• Stuck In A Cobweb
• Glimpse Of Memory
• Rising Wildfire 
• In A Flooding Room
• The Cold Of Dark
• Rescue
• The Confrontation
• In Your Haven
• The Ultimate Challenge
• Overcoming
• No Teu Abrigo