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   FATES WARNING — A Pleasant Shade Of Grey

    Review by 

        The T

    (TGTR)

    This being my first review for this web site, I should have started with a positive one, 
shouldn't I? Well, this one really is not...in fact, I have to acknowledge this isn't really a 
review of this particular album, but of the band as a whole....

Let's start with the positive: Fates Warning is without a doubt a really talented band, 
instrumentally speaking. Jim Matheos is a great guitarist, an extremely original one 
above all, capable of unique riffs and chord progressions;  maybe I don't totally love his 
sense of structure (or his lack of, for that matter) but that's not his biggest drawback, 
which is... not being able to understand his band's main drawback, which is.... more of 
that later. 

Let's talk for a second about Fates Warning's best musician, without any doubt Mark 
Zonder, the drummer. He's not only more then capable at playing really difficult 
rhythms and patterns, but he also has one quality not many drummers possess: 
elegance, finesse, knowing when to play like an octopuss and when to keep it simple; 
with his outstanding 
hi-hat patterns  (they're so great, he shoult trademark them) he delivers in a manner 
many loud, double-bass-three-armed-five-legged-noise machines just can't. Only a 
drummer can really appreciate what this guy does, and me being one, I'm telling you, 
he's one of the best. 

So, we have a great guitarist, a unique, amazing drummer, a good bass player and a 
gifted second-guitar, so what is the problem then with this band? How come they have 
never reached the same status in the prog/prog-metal world as some bands with lesser 
talented musicians? I, for one, think that fault relies exclusively in one person (or 
maybe in two, as I will explain later): Alder, the singer. 

How is it possible there are people who actually praise this awful singer's work? What 
really amazes me is how bad a shape certain people's ears are, for saying that this guy 
knows how to sing is the same as saying bush knows how to rule: both were elected for 
the job, and both have no idea how it's done. Please, just listen: Alder DOESN'T SING, 
NEVER, what he does is SCREAM. Have you ever heard a catchy chorus by Fates 
Warning? Have you ever heard a touching vocal melody in one of their songs? No, what 
you can applaud is always the INSTRUMENTAL-RELATED aspects of Fates Warning, not 
their song craftmanship, but mostly because they DON'T HAVE A SINGER, BUT YELLER. 
Alder always "sings " like this, and I dare you to correct me if I'm wrong: he speaks 
(or "sings") the first few words of a phrase in a monotone, boring high pitched tone, 
and before he reaches the verse's final part, he suddenly raises his voice till the 
maximum of his throat's capability (yes, he sings with his throat) and sustains the same 
insipid, ear-hurting, high-pitched note/cry/alarm/whatver tone until............... yes, 
until he starts the next phrase, when the process begins again; let's give an example: 
let's say he is "singing" the verse "digging in and out". In a weird Alderophonic 
translation, this is how it would look:         

(one tone-medium-no discernible note or key) di-gging in and
(extremely highpitched cry) OUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUt!  (yes, he is 
very good at sustaining the same vocal for really long periods of time, what a 
wonderful singer, isn't he?)

I'm sorry but it bothers me when I listen to Fates Warning music and realize, once and 
again, this could be a top band had it no the world's best same-pseudonote-sustainer in 
place of a capable, talented singer. Yes, musicianship in FW is so good I actually come 
back to their music even though is another alder's voice-bearing session. But then I put 
a cd by, for example, Dream Theater.... Man, what a contrast! Here we have a guy 
that maybe it's not that good at YELLING, (when he tries that sometimes his throat 
gives up), but who is marvelous at SINGING, SINGING...LaBrie knows that his voice can 
carry a melody, SING MUSICAL NOTES, CDEFGAB, and then, he sings.... Put any name 
in prog-metal here: Geoff Tate, Gildenlow, Damian Wilson, Mac, Kuntz, (and only prog-
metal... let's not talk about other genres for I'd never end) For Alder, singing is just 
sustaining the same quasi-note for long amounts of time....

And that's the other thing that bothers me about MAtheos: not being able to realize 
what an awful singer he writes music for... then, maybe matheos himself is not a really 
great musician...for the first thing you have to have in order to play good music is, A 
GOOD SENSE OF HEARING.... and listening the kind of "singing" Matheos likes, well, I'm 
sure he doesn't. 

This, A Pleasant Shade of Grey, contains everything I just talked about: great 
musicianship, amazing drumming, innovative guitar-playing, unique song-structures, 
coherent lyrics, a good concept, but also, lack of catchy melodies, lack of truly beautiful 
passages, and....LOTS OF YELLING AND ONE-NOTE-SUSTAINING.....

And this is, for sure, their best album alongside Parallels.... so, if you want to start 
listening to Fates Warning please do not choose FWX, Perfect Symmetry or 
Disconnected, for, if you have musical taste, Alder by himself will make you not listening 
to any other FW record ever again....If you are a drummer or if you can handle 
abnoxious, irritant voices, give this album a try, and you'll agree: this could have been 
one of the GREATS,

but it's not... any idea why???

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