I have always adored this group. They don't seem to have much sucess these days, but back in the early nineties they were at the peak of their fame and filling a gap in the music scene. Who are they: With Michael Cretu at the healm, Enigma were a new-age act who fused dance and ambience and breathy vocals. Their biggest hit was the number one 'Sadness.' On this album: You get the number hit 'Sadness' or 'Sadeness' as it is called here. This is a stirring and haunting number, with Gregorian chant sitting wonderfully over a hyptnotic beat. The track is a little too long for my liking, but there is a super panpipe section. More of ...  Read the complete review

Enigma is, I think, one of those artists who you either "got into" at the time or didn't. They did produce some outstanding tracks and they also produced a lot of canned pap. Their 1990 album MCMXC a.D was, however, arguably one of their best and started a decade of great progressive music from a number of sources. Enigma is hard to classify. As with many acts of the early 90s they broke the rules and shook up music mixing genres to create sounds at odds with the pop of the 80s. MCMXC is no exception - trance, meets rock, meets elecronica, meets Gregorian chant. Work that out! Also, unlike the 3 minute wonder tracks that were being ...  Read the complete review

I first listened to this album a long time ago but only really found out what it was and listened to it properly late last year (or early this year, I'm not sure) and really enjoyed it. Rather than being an album where you might listen to a single track and then go and listen to something else I think the album is far more like a single listening experience and to get the most from the album you should really listen from it from the start to the finish. It isn't however the sort of album where you have to pay attention to really enjoy, this is the sort of thing you can easily have playing in the background and still be able to do anything else, I ...  Read the complete review

"Good evening. This is the voice of Enigma. For the next hour, we will take you with us to another world, to the world of music, spirit, and meditation." And that is what Enigma is all about. MCMXC aD is the first Enigma album produced by Michael Cretu. There are two versions, the standard album, and a limited edition album, containing extra mixes of four songs on the album. This limited edition isn't too difficult to find, and is worth hunting down. Many of you are likely to know of Enigma, although you may not know it. The song you are likely to know from this album is the single 'Sadeness', a relaxed tune which makes use of ...  Read the complete review

The promise of the introduction to this album is for a relaxing hour of music. Well, it's actually 45 minutes at best so that's a bad start if ever there was one. But a small point. Basically a collaboration between a German producer and former Euro-favourite vocalist, 'Sandra', this album is a mystical experience. I don't care much for the two that came after this one as they had nowhere near the atmosphere. It just shows you what can be done with electronic music. It's dancey, ambient, atmospheric and makes good use of the chanting of Gregorian monks. In fact, that's what Engma are for me: atmospheric Gregorian monks. I couldn't really put this in a group with anything  Read the complete review