Never EVER liked Dream Theater except Train of Thought.

Not even Images and Words?

Nope. LaBrie does nothing for me and I find the music overly pretentious and boring. I mostly like my metal and prog rock apart from each other.

Take the highlights out of the first three DT albums and you'd end up with a solid album.

So I've been listening to Fates Warning's No Exit again these days and while it's certainly flawed (the vocals aren't great and that long epic can fuck off) I wonder if there's anything that is in a similar style. Think of slightly unusual power/thrash with plenty of acoustic passages.

Maybe something like Haven - Age of Darkness. Skip the cheesy ballads, but about 60% of the songs are really good.

I hesitate to say it but my band's debut album might fit the bill too. Our drummer thought so at least, from what he's told me.

It's a weird middle ground. What about Damn the Machine's s/t album?

If somebody likes some dirty, rocking, very Motorhead-ish speed metal they should check out Terrorwheel from Finland and the only album they released "Rhytm'n'Murder". Some very cool tunes on there!

I'm looking for heavy metal with harmonic and catchy riffing. Catchy, somewhere between Maiden, Priest and King Diamond. Great falsetto vocals are a must! Thanks!

Crimson Glory?
Steel Prophet - Dark Hallucinations?
Winters Bane - Heart of a Killer?
1st 3 Fates Warning albums?

I would say Winter's Bane has some more US power metal heft to it than the usual Priest/Maiden combo but I also recommend that album. Great performance by Ripper!

Yeah, it's one of my faves. I heard it before Jugulator so I was actually a bit disappointed by Jug.

Wh...what? That is just so, so, SO wrong... Ivory Gates... that's a fucking masterpiece right there.

That particular Fates Warning track is really good but long epics often have the tendency to outright suck in terms of composition and being just too long and boring.

I'd much rather listen to ''Epitaph'' instead. Now that's a good epic - it's not as long as ''The Ivory Gate of Dreams'' obviously, but still goes through plenty of mood changes (and much more fluently, too!).

The music on on IGoD is far better crafted, if not the vocals.

New War Dogs sounds pretty fun so far.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1V4KxCi7jt8

Yup - nothing astounding but it is pretty good.

Gonna have to agree that Ivory Gate of Dreams is pretty lousy. Disjointed and meandering. No Exit in general isn't a great album.

Fates really came into their own on the long tracks in the later Alder era. And Yet It Moves, Still Remains, The Ghosts of Home - all absolute masterpieces. Of course, there's also A Pleasant Shade of Gray, but that's a different animal altogether.

I don't mean to break anyone's heart, but No Exit was always an ill-advised, half-baked "transition" album for me, sitting in between their 4 masterpieces... I like parts, but not complete songs. and that cover looks like a blemish compared to both their previous and later cover art... sorry.

spoiler for meme.

The only Fates Warning albums that matter are the ones before "No Exit" anyway.

Yeah that was pretty much my thoughts for the entire discussion. Perfect Symmetry has a couple of cool tracks, and No Exit has some neat riffs here and there, but ultimately Arch-era FW is the only FW I've ever cared about.

80s FW and 90s FW are two entirely different beasts, but I love both of them to death. Both styles have top-shelf tracks.

Perfect Symmetry and Parallels are very good. Theories of Flight is cool too. It's just a really different tone and even intended audience from the 80s stuff.

As far as I'm concerned, the only albums of theirs I don't care for are No Exit (awkward transitional phase) and Darkness in a Different Light (didn't grab me whatsoever). Everything else ranges from pretty good (Nights on Brocken, FWX, Theories of Flight) to outstanding (...basically everything else).

You got to try Arch/Matheos if you haven't. New one is mindblowing.

FWX fucking blows - with tracks like these it's hard to take it seriously. Fates Warning playing dumb rock music? No thanks!

Didn't Matheos regret not giving the band a new name after Arch left?

He absolutely should have because essentially it's two different bands.

He wanted to, but their label at the time wouldn't let him.

I can understand that - same stuff as the Black Sabbath "Seventh Star" case.

FWX is worse than the worst moments from Black Sabbath or Judas Priest, by far.

I don't get the hate for Seventh Star, even if it isn't exactly my thing. ''In for the Kill'', the title track and ''Turn to Stone'' are certainly fine tracks.

It's a great album. Even Forbidden has a few good tracks. FWX, IIRC, has none at all.

"Seventh Star" is fine. Not the best Sabbath album by far but some good songs on there and I like the vocal performance.

Acerus' The Clock Of Mortality is a superlative piece of metal. Daniel Corchado does everything on here and it's sort of a blackened, thrashy, but still quite epic and regal, take on old classic metal. It's just got such a raw, intense feel to it with him handling everything. The way he continues exploring his unique style and guitar playing is great - somehow it's not old yet, because he keeps finding new ways to keep killing on everything he does.

I feel the same way. It's probably the only album of theirs that I don't really like.

And I'm in with Emp on the lastest Arch/Matheos. I feel like it's the album that his and John Arch's careers have both been leading up to.

Matheos wanted to call the band "Queensryche Theater" after Arch left, but it didn't stick for whatever reason.

I actually like Parallels more than anything else released after Awaken the Guardian. It's pretty good lame wimp prog metal like a less shitty Rage for Order.

I actually like FWX a fair bit. The aggressive tracks are kind of boring, but apart from those it's got a lot of really interesting, moody things going on during which Zonder really gets to flex his creative muscles.

Darkness in a Different Light took a while to click for me, but I think I like it even more than Theories of Flight now. A lot of latter-era Fates is like that; it takes a long time to sink in, but once it does it's really, really satisfying.

I will second this! The vocals and production are not as polished as on the debut, but the song structuring and riffing feels less removed from his death metal band. Gives the songs more technicality and substance. 246 riffs contender.

Yeah the first one is solid, but feels a little too simple, and kinda like he's just trying stuff out. This one feels like a much more fully realized sound. It's epic barbarian shit with an occult feel to it. Super mystical and yet savage in attitude.

I actually think his vocals are better on this one. Sounds more unleashed and he seems to be doing more his own thing. The first one was a bit too much like the usual gruff metal vocal cliche - though not bad either.

I don't feel like those sort of gruff, barbarian vocals work well at all when they're so quiet. If not for that I would probably love that band.