{"id":2444226,"date":"2019-05-15T14:35:21","date_gmt":"2019-05-15T20:35:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=835824"},"modified":"2019-05-15T14:35:21","modified_gmt":"2019-05-15T20:35:21","slug":"song-you-need-to-know-arch-matheos-vermillion-moons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/music-news\/song-you-need-to-know-arch-matheos-vermillion-moons\/","title":{"rendered":"Song You Need to Know: Arch\/Matheos, \u2018Vermillion Moons\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/ArchMatheos-photo.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<p><span>Back in 1986, a Connecticut band called Fates Warning released <em><a href=\"https:\/\/fateswarning.bandcamp.com\/album\/awaken-the-guardian\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Awaken the Guardian<\/a>,<\/em> their third LP and a cornerstone of what would come to be known as progressive metal. With its labyrinthine song structures and John Arch\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Xw2-_eGs8oI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">wildly expressive vocals<\/a> \u2014 which combined swooping, acrobatic range with bizarre melodic invention \u2014 this was music for headbangers who somehow felt that contemporary albums by the likes of Iron Maiden were a little too tame.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>The album was a new peak for Fates Warning, but it was also their last release with Arch, who was <a href=\"http:\/\/fateswarning.com\/1996\/01\/01\/eternal-flame-john-arch-interview-1996\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">let go in 1987<\/a> after he declined to choose the band over his day gig. Fates Warning continued on with a new singer, and Arch left the business entirely, pursuing a career in carpentry. But in 2003, Arch reunited with Fates Warning guitarist Jim Matheos for an EP, and in 2011 \u2014 25 years after <em>Awaken the Guardian<\/em> \u2014 the pair released a new album, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/archmatheos.bandcamp.com\/album\/sympathetic-resonance\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Sympathetic Resonance<\/a>,<\/em> under the name Arch\/Matheos.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Like that album, the duo\u2019s new second LP, <em>Winter Ethereal,<\/em> features sleek, state-of-the-art production values. Beyond that, though, the singer and guitarist don\u2019t seem concerned in the slightest with sounding contemporary. Album opener \u201cVermillion Moons,\u201d a nine-minute epic that moves from charging hard rock to placid balladry, continues in the same vein that made <em>Awaken<\/em> such an escapist blast. The music \u2014 played by Matheos along with a rotating cast of rock\/metal aces, such as bassist Steve DiGiorgio and drummer Thomas Lang \u2014 sounds unfailingly tight and dramatic but what\u2019s most striking about the track, and the album as a whole, is Arch\u2019s performance.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>The singer has lost none of his extraordinary elasticity (check out those vertigo-inducing high notes in the song\u2019s opening minutes), but the intervening years have given his delivery a new poignancy. The song\u2019s climax, which finds him grabbing ahold of a twisty, unabashedly theatrical melody, is a serious goosebump-inducer, and a reminder of what a formidable talent Arch is \u2014 and how lucky we are to have him back.<br \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/music\/music-news\/john-arch-jim-matheos-fates-warning-vermillion-moons-835824\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Back in 1986, a Connecticut band called Fates Warning released Awaken the Guardian, their third LP and a cornerstone of what would come to be known as progressive metal. With its labyrinthine song structures and John Arch\u2019s wildly expressive vocals \u2014 which combined swooping, acrobatic range with bizarre melodic invention \u2014 this was music for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2444226","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-19 05:58:25","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley&#039;s Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2444226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2444226"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2444226\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2444226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2444226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2444226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}