Customer Reviews

Fragile Mind

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Much time has passed since Zero Hour's undisputable masterpiece The Towers of Avarice. The Tipton brothers are back with their third album along with long-time drummer Mike Guy. There is a newcomer on board, however. Original vocalist Erik Rosvold has been replaced by Fred Marshall who had lots of Zero Hour fans, myself included, anxious, since Erik Rosvold was an integral part of the Zero Hour's unique sound.

Well, Fred Marshall puts all worries aside easily. He has a strong voice, great control, and rich delivery. Moreover he was involved in the songwriting, adding his lyrics and vocal melodies with good results. He does sound different than Rosvold, as he seems to harmonise a lot with his own voice, and moves around in his range continuously. Granted his voice may not come off as original as Rosvold's, Fred Marshall is certainly one of the main reasons why Zero Hour's A Fragile Mind differs from their previous releases. The harmony vocals on "There for Me" are sure new additions to their songmanship, with distinct emphasis on melodic vocal lines. I personally think Marshall's delivery is uncannily similar to Roy Khan's earlier work with Conception and the last Kamelot album, even though Khan isn't mentioned as an influence on their website. The vocal melodies on the complex "Destiny is Sorrow" are amazing, punctuated by sweeping harmonies and atmospheric keyboards. Each song displays another aspect of Marshall's impressive vocal range. He sounds dark and evil on "Brain Surgery", a shorter piece filled with a manic guitar run hidden beneath ferocious bass and power drums, while "Twice the Pain" features great contrast between his softer fragile tone to a more extreme type of voice with thick layers of vocal harmonies. This song also has a very Towers period sound to it, perhaps because of the way the guitar riffs build and Troy's navigating a wicked bass line through labyrinthine passages. I love the vocal melody at the end, maybe Marhall's most effective moment on the album.

This album finds Jasun Tipton making use of more keyboard work, which I assume is to give the album a warmer presence compared to its predecessor. The music is still technical, but borrows more melodic elements in both defining the blueprint of the songs and the vocal style of the new singer. Some of the tunes are accented by moody keyboard sections to match Marshall's deeper vocal register, but they quickly segue into a massive wall of sound courtesy of fluid guitar runs, pounding bass, and forceful drum fills. Troy Tipton's staccato bass and Mike Guy's odd-metered drum beats on "Losing Control" reach their apex when Jasun throws in a bunch of palm-muted guitar riffs into the mix. The two instrumentals also show the band's two most extreme sides. "Somnecrophobia" is brutally heavy, encompassing the band's love for polyrhtmic Meshuggah riffage and Jason Becker meets Death Machine flow in composition. "Intrinsic", on the other hand, is the diametric opposite. It is heavily keyboard-filled with Troy Tipton's bass taking the lead. The song quitens down near the end and dissolves into a long spacy cinematic scenery with various sound effects sealing it. The most critical song is certainly the 12-minute title track, bound to be compared to their previous epic "Demise and Vestige" off The Towers of Avarice. This song is quite different though. It has a slow acoustic build-up with expressive vocals up until 4:00 minutes and then expands upon a somewhat jazzy bass solo that eerily reminds me of Michael Manring. To make things more adventurous, Jasun Tipton lays down a soaring guitar theme over the piece whilst Fred Marshall sings multi-octave hitting melodies. The piece is finished off with Jasun exploring whimsical Egyptian scales on the guitar, rendering it a very solid musical statement on the band's part.

Dino Alden is certainly one of the most amazing producers in the world. He impressively engineered, mixed and recorded the album with vivid bass and drum separation and a very massive guitar sound. Hearing in advance that the new album would be done by Alden was proof enough that it wouldn't disappoint. This band should continue to work with him eternally. Also the album was mastered by another genius Alan Douches (Dillinger Escape Plan) and Travis Smith was once again there to provide the artwork, which reminds me of a cross between the previous Zero Hour and Gordian Knot's Emergent. One of his best works indeed. A Fragile Mind, along with the new Sieges Even, was my most anticipated album of the year and it proved more than amazing to these ears.

I have always been a fan of zero. i like this album and the previous 2 albums. its a strong album the music is pretty solid. the drums and bass are as strong as ever on this album. with the difficult timeing still on this album. they got a new singer in this album. this worried me but, the new singer does his part well and fits in great. and last guitar, jasun tipson plays great like usual but, he barely even has two solos in this album. and that pissed me off because he is a great guitarist. but yes he still has allot of fast lead lines. and a few crazy parts. dont get me wrong. he still plays great in the album. now the reason i only gave 4 stars. because i feel the musicianship in their last album was tighter. and the music was more progressive. they are still progressive, but not as much as the last albums. and that kind of irritates me. but its still a great techinical prog metal album. and i sujest to buy it. its worth the money.

Disappointing to say the least. It's just more of the same riffs from the first two albums rehashed with considerably less vocal talent over the top of them. I realize now what truly put The Towers of Avarice over the top for me was original singer, Eric Rosvold. As long as you have Towers and Metamorphosis, you don't need anything else.

Okay, I have no idea why I am seeing so many awesome reviews on this CD. I got "Towers of Advince" after reading the reviews, and it was justified. That CD was very original sounding and flowed nicely. It was technical, but didn't lull you into boredom like Spiral Architect or something.

However, "Fragile Mind" COMPLETELY stinks. Every song sounds like the previous one, and they all sound like copycats of "Towers of Advince." Seriously, some riffs are straight out of their last albumn. You know how some bands just make a new CD that sounds like their successful one? Well this is like that.

I'm not saying this band sucks - because the last CD was one of the best progressive CD's I've ever heard. But this one put me to sleep. I've tried getting into it, but it's just the same sound over and over.