Thirty-five years ago, Fates Warning solidified their shift from torchbearers of US power metal with 1989’s Perfect Symmetry, forever moving their progressive path away from power metal and into an emotional, twisting fusion of playful and grooving tunes that no one has assembled quite the same way since. Primary songwriter and guitarist Jim Matheos has anchored the Fates Warning playbook throughout all these changes—from wizards and wailing (Night on Bröcken1 to The Spectre Within), to Rushin’ and rollin’, and to the edges of Fates Warning’s technical limits. So then, already twenty-plus years into their career at the launch of FWX, what left had Matheos and co. to explore with the Fates sound?
Leaning into similar ideas with which Matheos had already been exploring with his OSI project, FWX does touch down on organic ambience, pulsing electronic rhythms, and hypnotic guitar loops that pushed the Fates Warning boundaries into an alternative rock-inflected territory. At the turn of the ’00s, it wasn’t uncommon to hear a creeping Portis/Radiohead influence in downcast music, and from a similar timeframe you can hear this same exploration in Porcupine Tree works, Deadwing in particular, so hearing this flair in retrospect doesn’t feel too out of place. But at the time of its release, despite Fates Warning never lacking in overdriven riffs that build great songs in a wide range of progressive manners—eclectic but not particularly experimental—FWX did not land widespread critical acclaim.
The first time FWX graced my ears in full, its lack of progressive grandeur, namely in the histrionic solo department, took me aback. At the tail end of a career loaded with technical highlights and in a scene growing populated-to-bursting with descendants of the Dream Theater/Symphony X school of excess, Fates Warning built with a different kind of virtuosity—meticulous kit grooves, delayed chord loops, recursive and swelling melodies. In that lane, Matheos finds a kind of guitar-driven power that lands both more immediate in force and more playful in counterpoint layering than anything Fates Warning had produced since their landmark Parallels. The primary pattern of “Simple Human” crushes against doubling bass pulses and slinky, scattered high-frequency chord stabs; the doom-weighted drag of “Crawl” guides a laser-precise lead warble to crescendo; the high energy strum-stride of “Stranger (With a Familiar Face)”—FWX simply shouts its extremities where albums before it required a focused digestion.
But the shift from tactical flex serves twofold, with FWX riding a wave of emotion in a subdued manner, giving greater weight to its themes. Ray Alder had plenty already led his dramatic pipes to the softer identities of classic cuts like “Leave the Past Behind“2 (Parallels, 1991) or “Shelter Me” (Inside Out, 1993). Age graced Alder’s voice kindly, though, allowing him to find a lower register to inject increased doses of pathos into playful odes to depression (“Another Perfect Day”) and persistent negative thoughts (“Handful of Doubt”). Most importantly, time had also left scars enough to cap off FWX with one of Fates’ most beautiful tracks, “Wish,” where his pleading cry matches Matheos’ heartbeat-hum guitar pickings and mournful solo. In an album that already indulges in stellar songcraft, Alder’s success keeps FWX worth revisiting over and over.
As if this lineup for Fates Warning—the last of its kind as long-time drummer Mark Zonder, master of his craft, would not return for the 2013 follow-up—needed additional fuel for success, this streamlining approach yielded a timeless sound that I’ve been exploring for well over fifteen years. I’ve cried to FWX. I’ve also celebrated with FWX. I have loved and lost and loved again, watched people drift away while I blame myself or the world around me, finding solace in its dark and plaintive themes while enraptured by its dreamy and thundering soundscape. For a long time, FWX seemed like an unplanned farewell. And though Fates Warning has not officially hung up the spurs yet, “Wish” will always feel like a send-off filled not with regret but acceptance. That’s the beauty of iconic albums in our own listening history. Whether it’s what I need or what I want, spinning FWX turns any time into a time full of peak-quality tunes.
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