Review Summary: Parallels marks a transition to Fates Warning. It’s one of their best, important and coherent albums.
“Parallels” is the sixth studio album of Fates Warning and was released in 1991. The line up on the album is Ray Alder, Jim Matheos, Frank Aresti, Joe DiBiase and Mark Zonder. The album had also the participation of James Labrie and John Bailey.
Fates Warning is probably the earliest example of the merging of the progressive musical approaches of bands such as Rush and the heavy metal genre as pioneered by some other bands. They have had sort of an unofficial rivalry with another pioneering band of the progressive metal genre, Queensryche. However and according to the critics, their music is actually about as comparable as night and day. While the Seattle based quintet was mixing keyboards in and delving into political concepts, this group of musicians from Connecticut dealt mostly with mystical themes. Anyway, this album is somehow a bit more of a departure from that usual approach in favor of a more philosophical approach.
When in 1991 Fates Warning created “Parallels”, we can say they created one of their best, most important and coherent albums. Their sound keeps evolving through time, providing the progressive metal field with some unique and astonishing moments. “Parallels” is, in my humble opinion, a great place to start with Fates Warning, especially if you’ve never heard them before. I feel that “Parallels” marks their perfect transition from their old school roots to their more atmospheric experimental progressive phase. This album lies somewhere in between both worlds with guitarist Matheos focusing his attention and power on more concise songs, developed melodies and mapped out compositions.
Unlike the band’s earlier material, all songs are entirely written by Matheos, and therefore more defined and purposeful. Vocalist Alder is more established and sings with even more confidence. He is no longer trying to please the Arch era, but going for his own musical expression. Another new member, Zonder, adds his unique drumming skills with a lot more subtlety, compared to “Perfect Symmetry”, his debut with the band. Second guitarist Aresti and bassist DiBiase are still present, but their impact is less forceful than before, as they take a back seat when it comes to the songwriting.
With “Parallels”, the band reveals another “essence” in their music and creativity. Here we have a progressive sound with beautiful melodies, accompanied by a heavy metal groove. Honestly, I can’t trace a song that could be possibly valued as a mediocre one. We can find songs that suit our mood, fast and slower ones. Even the slower ballads are very characteristic and your spirit travels with them. Guitar parts are crystal clear and all the tunes are mixed in a way that could be described as “a nice orchestration”. Something that is worthy to mention is that I can’t spot “exaggerative” the performance of parts on the album. But we mustn’t forget that progression may result in overreaction, sometimes.
This is probably Fates Warning’s most accessible release, particularly in terms of structure. Songs such as “Eye To Eye” and “We Only Say Goodbye” are extremely catchy ballads with all the hooks necessary to be radio friendly. I believe that latter actually did enjoy a fair amount of attention from the mainstream. “Leave The Past Behind” and “Point Of View” have some rather complex musical devices, but still have highly catchy choruses and a very straight forward structure. “Don’t Follow Me”, is almost a holdover of their early work on “Night On Brocken”, which combines the sound of Iron Maiden with their own style. “The Road Goes On Forever” is a rather slow and straight forward ballad.
There are two tracks that contain a lot of more progressive elements that defined their previous 3 releases. “Life In Still Water” is structurally a fairly simple track, but the offbeat drum beats and constant fill-ins, superimposed over a rather intricate set of riffs make it a bit of an outlier amongst the more catchy songs. “The Eleventh Hour” is the lengthiest and most complex track, and is loaded with many formal twists and turns. This is Adler’s highlight vocal performance, as he stretches into the upper limits of his vocal register, and floods the entire song with a very strong sense of passion.
Conclusion: “Parallels” is an excellent Fates Warning album and it’s really a highly recommended companion to their previous album “Perfect Symmetry”. With “Parallels”, Fates Warning shows perfectly well how a band can mix their brilliant technical skills with a well structured songs, like Queensryche made with “Operation Mindcrime”. The final result is a mature album with class. This new more accessible direction the band took didn’t please all their fans, but this one comes highly recommended. Even some critics and fans dislike the album and they calling it, Fates Warning’s “biggest commercial if not artistic success” and “an ideal first purchase for fans of the traditional 80’s metal”. Anyway, “Parallels” is a great addition for any Fates Warning’s fans. It’s not quite heavy but that doesn’t mean it isn’t heavy, because there are some sections with some heaviness. Definitely this is perhaps one of Fates Warning’s best releases.
Music was my first love.
John Miles (Rebel)
