Fewer combos in metal have spurred music in my wheelhouse as that of Ray Alder and Jim Matheos. Their union for Fates Warning’s 1988 release No Exit burst in the budding progressive metal scene with USPM histrionics and Rush-fueled narrative structure. Of course, that was near forty years ago. At sixty vs twenty, your mind (mostly) thinks differently, your voice cracks differently, your hair grays and may even thin. In the case of Alder and Matheos, while immune to the loss of hair, do fall in line to some extent with the other consequences of time. Alder, for his part, has slowly adapted his caterwauling to a lower-register, full-voiced croon, gracing many later era Fates albums with his refined calls, as well as providing some power to important Redemption albums and 2023’s A-Z release. Matheos has foreshadowed his own growing ethereality with the electro-alt-prog of OSI and pet ambient project Tuesday the Sky displaying little of the riff and raucous of his heaviest work. North Sea Echoes, then, naturally follows this gentler path. Do its waves even make a sound worth echoing though?
Maybe you caught the last Fates record or Alder’s follow-up solo release, but even amongst the heavier distortion numbers on those jams, Alder’s performances have tended to his sleepier, softer side. North Sea Echoes, of course, doesn’t sell itself any other way, stirring a current throughout Really Good Terrible Things that’s more of the fizzle of a wave dragged over rocks into a tide pool rather than an open beach crash. In that regard, many of Matheos’ spindly guitar works flitter about like the bright and climbing melodies of a Helios breeze (“Throwing Stones,” “We Move Around the Sun”) with Alder’s warm voice finding the surge in the way synth embellishments could in a less minimal approach. When North Sea Echoes does attempt to hit a little harder with bass-leaning patches and the rare bit of guitar distortion, songs lean toward a build reminiscent of Matheos’ OSI work, albeit approached with a voice fueled by a passion for life in all its peaks and valleys (“Flowers in Decay,” “Empty”).
However, in this post rock-informed, downtempo-tinged, ambient-goaled, North Sea Echoes has a hard time finding hypnosis in any particular realm of relaxation that Really Good Terrible Things enters. After a fairly snappy two-track kick-off, the dreamy-pedaled “Unmoved” springs to life with Alder’s sultry, somber allure in full force, so much so that at the nine-minute mark we’ve already encountered a crescendo far too large—complete with the extended “aaaah aaaah” de-escalation to fade—for an album with seven more slow-burning steps remaining. Later with “Where I’m From” and “We Move Around the Sun” Alder again reaches for the throats of his fiery words only to come back down to a waning, repetitive vocalization. One of these three tracks by itself could have provided the necessary peak in this kind of extra chilled-out Portishead-y experience, but scattered they work against each other to create a successful float.
On the plus side, most of the music rests in the hands of Matheos’ strings and synths, the former of which remains both the most expressive and expansive across this ten-track trek. It’s hard to say whether Really Good Terrible Things would have faired better as an instrumental set, as tracks like “Flowers in Decay,” “Throwing Stones,” and “No Maps” capture a powerful unison between Matheos’ diverse amplifications and Alder’s butter-melting serenades. And if it weren’t for guest Gunnar Olsen simultaneously riding steady on “Throwing Stones” and crashing the kit on “Empty,” I wouldn’t have noticed much that the rest of the percussive presence is all of Matheos’ spacious programming, which shines on the glitchy, upbeat kicker “The Mission.” Closer “No Maps,” however, does stumble a bit in its guitar-lite presentation, relying on a gradual, swirling synth build and Alder to put a lightly-etched period on its still digestible run.
Though, unless you’re really into what North Sea Echoes has to say—the lyrics are fairly uplifting all around—there’s a good chance you’ll check out at some point. I know I did. As a fan of ambient music, I crave immersion. And, despite the time-tested pedigree of the legendary performers involved on Really Good Terrible Things, that immersion never quite finds its pillow-y, smothering hold. Never stealing my breath nor providing the internal space for an inhale that pulls in all the world’s healing air, North Sea Echoes, for me, is neither swell nor even splash.
Rating: 2.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp
Websites: northseaechoes.com | facebook.com/northseaechoesofficial | northseaechoes.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: February 23rd, 2024
