James LaBrie vs. Michael Eriksen

Many, if not most prog fans know, or at least have heard of these two amazing vocalists. James LaBrie, from Dream Theater; and Michael Eriksen, from Circus Maximus. Recently I’ve been thinking about the vocal talents and styles of both these vocalists. I’m only guessing here, but I believe that Michael has a greater vocal range than James. However, I would rather listen to James LaBrie for his tonal characteristics. I really like Michael, but there’s something about his voice that bugs me every time I listen to him. It could just be his accent, being Norwegian. To elaborate further, I mentioned that I liked LaBrie’s voice better. By that I mean his voice circa. 1993, during the Images and Words album and tour. I am aware of the food poisoning incident, and I take my figurative hat off to him for persisting through that tough period in his life. In my opinion his voice remained great up until Score in 2006. I guess something weird happened from then on. I now am not particularly fond of his voice. For instance, I believe he sounds horrendously bad on Chaos in Motion, especially on their most recent studio material from Systematic Chaos (his most ear-piercingly annoying moments are from Surrounded ‘07, Lines in The Sand, although in that song he had his moments, and Forsaken, which was dreadfully bad). Having said this, for performances of Dream Theater’s earlier material, namely off of Images and Words, he sounds adequate. A lot of my friends criticise me for even mentioning that his voice has lost it’s touch, and character, but quite frankly it has. They always bring up the food poisoning incident, and yes, I am very aware. I am aware he lost part of his range. However, he himself stated that he didn’t feel vocally normal until 6 or 7 years after the incident had occured, which was around 2000, with Live Scenes From New York (which I dig by the way). However, that was almost 10 years ago, and he hasn’t gotten much better since. And as I said previously, he sounded really good in 2006 on Score. I know I sound very negative towards James LaBrie, but please don’t take it the wrong way. I really like James, and it is quite clear to anyone who listens to him sing, that there is an obvious talent that he possesses. I’m just slowly becoming more critical about the way he sounds. And yes, he can still hit most of the high notes that he hit in 1993, but they just don’t sound very good anymore. That’s also why I don’t like seeing them play certain songs from Images and Words, especially Another Day, as much as I love the song.

Not much criticism is due for Michael Eriksen at present, just praise. However, it’s still early days. I’m sure early Dream Theater fans from the early nineties weren’t expecting James to contract such a bad case of food poisoning, and then go against doctor’s orders and destroy his vocal chords even further on the Awake tour. Only time will tell I suppose.

Kind of a strange entry, but whatever. If you liked it, or even if you didn’t let me know what you think.

Talk to you soon
Jared