Yeah exactly mate.i'm glad you like them, and get that vibe from them, because that's what music you like should do for you.
Ephel Duath
The new FW is boring. They should have ended on a high note with FWX.
OSI is dead to me. Their second album was the only one I really liked.Thinking of FW, I re-discovered last year's OSI album. It's rather good.
This, this this and so much more. In every way I agree.Wow, no. I like some of it, but I have to say this is their worst album since... well, since Night On Brocken. No innovation, nothing pushing any sort of boundaries. I've heard this all before, but done better. Both by these guys and by other bands. I mean, could they have ripped Opeth off any harder on that intro part of "Into the Black"? Very bad decision by Matheos to ditch the keyboards and electronic influences. That made modern FW special. A lot of this music just ends up sounding like stuff that wasn't good enough to make it onto the Arch/Matheos album. His heavy riffs are all very samey and that's never been as exposed as it is here. Alder is one of my all-time faves, but his melodies are nowhere near as creative and dynamic as what Arch did so some of this does come off a bit more boring. Also, I like guitar solos, but none of the solos here can even hold a candle to anything from when Aresti was in the band in the 80s-90s. Just disappointing on every level. Not even gonna get into the double bass pedal abuse... I want Zonder back RIGHT NOW!
FWX is a classic, man. Half filler? Sure, it had "Simple Human", but there was also "Left Here", "River Wide Ocean Deep", etc. ...come on. Those were some fresh ideas, forward thinking music. I haven't been this disappointed in an album since Paradise Lost! I can't believe this! Ahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!
For being an arrangement, guy, he certainly failed this time. Every song is formulaic. Even the "epic" "And Yet It Moves" seemed like two songs in one track with silence between. Ripped off Opeth? Yes, but with nowhere near the execution Opeth could pull off. The rhythms are boring and rehash, the lyrical content is unchallenging and hardly emotional, doesn't have any bite to it. Not creative, just a boring, generic prog album. I think the new FW is their worst effort to date.Matheos isn't about riffs, he's about songwriting and arrangements. Always has been. He basically invented the prog metal rhythm guitar that's ubiquitous now, but he uses it as a compositional tool. Think of the rhythm guitar as part of the song and not as "riffing" and his playing makes much more sense, IMO, especially when you also listen to the bass and drums (I agree that Zonder's better, but Mark Zonder is Mark Zonder, what are you going to do...)
As far as being "forward-thinking," what do you think about Lighthouse and And Yet It Moves, for example? Both are pretty unconventional. Though I'm not as impressed with breaking conventions alone as I used to be...
OSI is dead to me. Their second album was the only one I really liked.
This, this this and so much more. In every way I agree.
For being an arrangement, guy, he certainly failed this time. Every song is formulaic. Even the "epic" "And Yet It Moves" seemed like two songs in one track with silence between. Ripped off Opeth? Yes, but with nowhere near the execution Opeth could pull off. The rhythms are boring and rehash, the lyrical content is unchallenging and hardly emotional, doesn't have any bite to it. Not creative, just a boring, generic prog album. I think the new FW is their worst effort to date.
If I were to cite arrangement kudos for FW, I'd pick "River Wide Ocean Deep", "APSOG", and tracks off Disconnected & Parallels. What we have on the new disc reminds me of Redemption or Arch/Matheos, neither of which held any interest for me. Hell, the first Redemption album, without Alder, was the best thing that band ever did. And I like Alder. He can do great stuff. Whoever wrote the new FW though... they've been taking cues from Dream Theater and radio metal and that's a terrible loss.