It is rare to encounter music as genuinely invigorating as this. It contains actual mood-enhancing melodies. I tell you – there is magic in this Fellowship.
You may think I am exaggerating. After all, this is just a power-metal record. Don’t all power metal records worth their groats have the, err, power to motivate?
But this is different. There is so much melody and joyousness in this record – not so much in an “everything is awesome” kind of way, more of a “you are worthy, no matter what others think” sort of message. Some may recoil, with the opinion that it’s all so… nice, so major-key. I mean what sort of self-respecting metal band opens their album with a song called ‘Hold Up Your Hearts (Again)’, complete with a catchy-as-hell chorus and a key-change within the first four minutes? I’ll tell you who: Fellowship, who are confident enough in their craft to not care a jot what people may think of their music. Let the recoilers recoil, let them wallow in their refusal to embrace the potential for the listener to be lifted. And kudos to the band for putting in a set of parentheses in the title of the opening track, in a nod to the first song of their debut, ‘Until the Fires Die’, in which the lyrics “Hold your hearts up and lift them high” featured prominently.
Speaking of Fellowship’s first album, The Saberlight Chronicles, those who heard it already know of the band’s power. It was a masterpiece of positive-energy power metal, coming out of nowhere (well, Harwich, which is quite a distance from pretty much every other town in the world). Reddit threads covering almost all genres of metal lit up with posts from fans with a common phrase: “I don’t usually like power metal, but…” then gushing about the nature of the album, loosely based on a quest (accompanied by a novella) but chock full of motivation and triumph over self-doubt. Was it cheesy? Of course. But did it put smiles on faces? Hell, yes. Rumour has it that sertraline consumption plummeted after Saberlight was released, such was its power in banishing the black dog from people’s lives.
And this one is just as good. Sure, there isn’t the element of surprise that Saberlight boasted, but all the other ingredients are there. And there is talk of another novella to accompany it as well.
Everything in The Skies Above Eternity seems so effortless – like a gymnast scoring a perfect 10, it looks easy and is immensely satisfying to witness – but there has clearly been a lot of work gone into creating the album. Take the descending three-note chute that takes us between lines in the pre-chorus to ‘Dawnbreaker’. Or the double-time vocal delivery in ‘Eternity’. They sound utterly natural, as if no other phrasing could even be entertained.
And it is not a mere rehash of Saberlight, either. There are darker topics, like ‘Victim’ – even though it has a narrative arc which ends with triumph over adversity. That small victory is expressed, with utter conviction, by the line “Forgive me my transgressions, as I lead a life of lessons”. Yes, written down it sounds cheesy. But it works in a Fellowship song.
And the musicality has been dialed up a notch. The aforementioned effortless melodic phrases and rousing harmonics bring to mind those of X Japan, the metacular pioneers of visual kei, led by a bona-fine classical composer Yoshiki, a master of a gorgeously crafted chord progression. Listen to the chorus – and key change – in ‘New Hope’, the final vocal track on The Skies Above Eternity and you will get what I mean.
Honestly, I could go on and on about how good this album can make you feel. And if you come out in a rash at the mere mention of power metal, get this: vocalist and lyricist Matthew Corry didn’t even know he liked the genre until he teamed up with drummer and songwriter Callum Tuffen. So if it is good enough for him, then it is good enough for us. And trust me: this album will make you smile, in all the best ways possible.
