Arch Matheos
Former Fate’s Warning compatriots reunite for a second outing.
It can’t be easy being John Arch. His short-but-sweet period with Fates Warning positioned him as progressive metal’s ultimate could-have-been contender. The US group’s first vocalist and co-writer had an astonishingly wide-range and seemingly ever-developing power, but left the band in 1987 after the release of the tantalising fan favourite Awaken The Guardian. A year on, his former bandmates, led by guitarist Jim Matheos, would recruit replacement Ray Alder
and go on to release their breakthrough record No Exit, cementing their place alongside Dream Theater and Queensrÿche as part of progressive metal’s founding trinity.
Matheos stayed in touch with his former collaborator, but Arch never toured again and instead busied himself with life in the real world – as a partner, a father, an employee. Music became a hobby, and the frontman in him took a backseat. In the eyes of the fans, however, John Arch’s light was never fully dulled. Across the intervening decades, the rumour of this lost talent sacrificed at the altar of band politics continued to spread and the Arch myth was made. Then, in 2015, the vocalist got a call from Matheos: how would he feel about reuniting with the group’s 1986 line-up for two shows celebrating Awaken The Guardian’s 30th anniversary?
“Immediately, it’s a panic attack within me,” recalls Arch of that first conversation. “I’m saying to myself, ‘Okay, this is stuff that I sang and wrote in my early 20s and it was hard back then, so here I am, kind of an old man, and
I’m going to step on stage again…’
But I really knew it was something
that had to be done. I definitely owed it to the fans, their support has been humbling, so I kind of said, ‘Okay,’ and then a day later I got a phone call from Jim saying, ‘Oh, by the way, we’re going to shoot a live DVD for both shows.’ I’m like, ‘Oh, nice. I like the way you did that!’”
“Saying that touring is not something that John likes to do now is an understatement,” adds Matheos. “It’s not something where he just says, ‘Well they’re going to get what they get.’ He really loses a lot of sleep about these things, so I felt bad for him. He puts a lot of pressure on himself. But that’s one of the things that I admire about him and why I like working with him, because I know that I’m going to get that result.”
The collaboration had been rekindled before: on 2003 EP, A Twist Of Fate, and the first Arch/Matheos release, 2011’s Sympathetic Resonance, where Arch collaborated on tracks originally intended for Fates Warning. Both evidenced a vocal still in-tact, but the live shows were a significant challenge.
“It was a huge undertaking for him, physically, just to get his voice in shape again,” emphasises Matheos. “He hadn’t done any dates at all of that size since the mid-80s, then he’d kind of had this whole thing built up around of him of God status. So there’s that added pressure. He wanted to be able to sing what he put down on those records so long ago. But he’s also got this myth built-up about him – and he’d got to live up to that as well.”
A year of prep came before the …Guardian shows, yet they passed in the blink of an eye.
“In my eyes, I am never prepared, no matter how much I rehearse, not matter how hard I try,” says Arch. “But I committed to it, and before you know it, there I was, standing on stage, and the lights came up, and I was like, ‘Oh shit, here we go.’ Then the first note hits, and there’s no turning back at that point.”
It’s not hand-to-hand combat, but it’s hard to think of a more potent fight or flight scenario for someone in the vocalist’s position – the gamble of a lifetime’s id and ego for a few nights’ entertainment.
“It was a lot of weight,” acknowledges
Arch. “But then you see the lights on the fans, and you
“You know you’re at a point in your life where you’re getting older and that if you’re going to do something you better hop on it.” John Arch
realise they are not that hyper-critical person that you are. They are already pumped, and they’re loving the music and it’s like a sea of warmth that comes over you.”
The shows were regarded as a triumph: emphatically cementing the mythology around Arch’s vocal ability. His voice – a Bruce Dickinson-type with a writer’s ear for melodic intricacy – is not just age-defying but sits among the finest in prog metal. Even digging through the usually caustic YouTube commentary on live footage, the feedback is overwhelmingly positive: “the Shakespeare of metal vocalists”, “what Fates Warning should have been”, “Jeez fkn christ! John Arch just gave me chills” etc.
It is easy to over-romanticise the fulfilling of this mythology and it should not undermine the significant and underrated accomplishments of Fates Warning’s own creative evolution, yet the catharsis for both fans and band was palpable. The first few years after Arch’s departure from the group had been “a little rough”, says Matheos, “but I think that can never really be a smooth transition.” Fortunately, time – particularly time away – is a great healer.
“We got older and we reassessed,” summarises Arch. “I’m not the type of person to hold grudges, because life is hard enough as it is. I was always behind them, I was never jealous, and I always wished them the best of luck. Then, sooner or later, we moved on, to become friends, and eventually began working together again.”
The shows were thus a tipping point – an important public acknowledgement, but with all that preparation done and the good energy still coursing through their veins, thoughts started to turn to a reprisal of that Arch/ Matheos moniker and a new record.
“John’s got this really strange dichotomy of being this really grounded person who has a job and a family, and at the same time, this artist’s temperament,” reflects Matheos. “Which is 180 degrees different from that. He has to have both those living in his head and I can see that duel thing going on all the time. But I think this time, having a taste of being in a band again got him inspired.”
“Inherently,” clarifies Arch. “You know you’re at a point in your life where you’re getting older and that if you’re going to do something you better hop on it.”
The resulting record, Winter Ethereal, may take fans by surprise – tipping the hat to the blend of Yes and Maiden that so inspired the genre’s first-wavers, with a hard-hitting contemporary production that powers it away from cliché. Wanderlust stacks a Dio-esque vocal jaunt over a thunderous and addictive harmony riff, while Never In Your Hands bounces with pep. Ultimately, both musicians sound invigorated – believing enough in their strengths as writers and performers to spar without pulling punches. The impact on both is palpable, not least in Matheos’ lead playing, much of which is first or second take stuff – and very out of character for the meticulous craftsman.
“Never to this point have I thought of leaving those,” admits Matheos. “I always have someone else do a lead or I meticulously go back later, but Arch kept telling me, ‘These are great, just like that’ and convinced me to leave them in there. That’s what I like about working with him. He pushes me outside my comfort zone.”
“It ended up being where he does the majority of the leads on this album,” continues Arch. “In the end, I did compliment him on his lead work, because I thought it was well deserved. The very ending of Kindred Spirits, for instance, he does a David Gilmour type of lead, but it’s just so melodic, it’s so theatrical, and it’s so fitting. I thought it was beautiful.”
Winter Ethereal is a fitting tribute to a relationship that, against the odds, has endured for 37 years. Did either party picture the duo making music together after so long?
“Yeah, truthfully, probably not,” admits Arch. “And that’s my own inner working
[to blame] because, to be honest, my biggest fear was fear itself, of having the confidence in myself, and coming back. [If anything] I wish I’d the courage a little bit earlier to get in front of the mic again, because it’s been nothing but rewarding since then. It just goes to show sometimes even at my age, you can still accomplish things and you can still do your best.”
Matheos perhaps summarises it best:
“I put it all down to the fact that I don’t know how to do anything else,” he reflects with characteristic clarity. “Ultimately, it’s fun to be able to do what you love but, sometimes, it’s not the easiest thing.”
Winter Ethereal is out now via Metal Blade. See www.facebook.com/archmatheos for more information.
“John’s got this really strange dichotomy of being this really grounded person who has a job and a family, and at the same time, this artist’s temperament.” Jim Matheos