Enigma: The Screen Behind The Mirror

Michael Cretu's Enigma project has made four albums of lush, stone-serious, New Age-ish mush, characterized mostly by its frequent emphasis on dance beats, elements of classical music, samples, and Gregorian chants. It's easy to dismiss the result as a pretentious bore, and it does tend to wash together in large doses, but Cretu is no dummy: Enigma's music frequently employs legitimate hooks, and as a result, it's yielded two massive-selling guilty-pleasure pop hits in "Sadeness, Part I" and "Return To Innocence," a worldwide sensation in 1990's MCMXC A.D., and more than 25 million albums sold overall. The new The Screen Behind The Mirror may or may not duplicate Cretu's pop success—its dull 1996 predecessor, Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi!, sure didn't, at least in America—but it won't fail for a lack of catchy moments. "Between Mind & Heart" is silly and self-indulgent, but it's got a backing-vocal track that inspires instant recognition upon subsequent listens. The single "Gravity Of Love" is a similarly subliminal ballad, featuring the lead singer of the dance-pop outfit Olive. At times, The Screen Behind The Mirror is unintentionally funny, as when the New Age swoon of "Smell Of Desire" bleeds into the ludicrous '80s hard rock of "Modern Crusaders." But the album's best moments help it serve its purpose as layered, occasionally interesting background noise, which is an ideal use for music that suffers the closer you listen to it.