A Pleasant Shade Of Gray

A Pleasant Shade Of Gray

Fates Warning

Metal Blade, 1997

REVIEW BY: Matthew Turk

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 03/04/2003

This band has a lot of cojones. Progressive metal pioneers FatesWarning don't create a concept album; A Pleasant Shade of Gray isn't even a loose concept album.To be either of those things, it would have to be made of manydifferent songs, strung together on a common thread. And what wehave here, friends, is a single song extended to almost an hour,divided into twelve parts. How does one even approach an album likethis? Yes, the twelve parts are different, but they are tiedtogether musically and lyrically, so much so that calling them asingle song is not only justified, but natural.

The opening track is just an introduction to the concept: "sowhere do we begin / and what else can we say? / when the lines areall drawn / what should we do today?" This isn't a story ofhappiness, or sadness, but of listlessness, despair, emptiness --it could even be called a depiction of clinical depression. Don'tbuy this album expecting grooves or metal solos, as those are bothfew and far between.

The music is a reflection, in many ways, of the concept of thealbum -- intentionally so. The third part of the song featuresspectacular vocal delivery over top of very distinct and deliberateguitar riffing, but it's a long way from the metal edges of Parallels.The first hint of a "driving tune" is with partfour, and even that takes a while to get going -- past theexquisite "oohs" in the middle, we get to hear a slick guitar line,accompanied perfectly by drums. Part five gives us our first tasteof the true chorus: "let nothing bleed into nothing / and didnothing at all." This accusatory phrase shows up throughout therest of the album; truly, the musical continuity is admirable.

The album begins to cool off after reaching a fevered pitch atthe end of part five; we are treated to wistful, mournful guitar.From nowhere, a driving bass line draws us further and further. Itis with this track that most of the musical risks are taken --spacious landscapes are drawn in pencil and daubed with ink, untilvocals come in and bring a sensation of fading andhopelessness.