Can't believe a Gothenburg sort of thread got this far without me. Though AE isn't technically Gothenburg and is more an offshoot of Carcass/Napalm Death grindcore in their early days since the Amott brothers are British/Swedish and spent a lot of their time in the UK.
Chris Amott is a very underrated player, but he is no longer in Dark Tranquillity as of recently. To be honest, it's difficult for him to play in their stripped down, ambient style that Niklas Sundin created.
AE's choice of singers is about image. I hate to be blunt about it, but Alissa White-Gluz's main thing is sex appeal. She is simply beautiful. She looks great on posters, band photos, and on YouTube video previews.
That said, she is also an excellent singer (see her work in Metal Allegiance with Ellefson, Skolnick, Portnoy, Owens, Holt, and many others on the cover of Dio's "We Rock." We holds her own with Tim Owens and Chris Jericho.) She's a much better, more well rounded singer than Angela Gossow.
That said, Angela was better for what Arch Enemy does. Angela has a great voice for death metal and fierce stage presence.
In my opinion, they replaced Angela for two reasons: 1) her complicated relationship with Michael Amott (they're married but I believe they keep it low key--Angela has stayed on as manager for AE) and 2) she got "too old," having stepped down after "Khaos Legions" when she was 37.
Angela sang for the band between ages 27 and 37, so I think that says a lot right there. As she got closer to 40, the band probably felt they had to reinvent themselves, first as the now so-called "Black Earth" era band with Johan Liiva, then Angela's time in the band, and now Alissa's.
I love a lot of stuff like the original "Fields of Desolation," (the one in B standard from "Black Earth," not C standard when they re-recorded it). "Wages of Sin" will always be a classic record for me.
But AE, like Slayer, does have a ton of filler. I lost interest in them when I wasn't sure whether it should be called "AE featuring Jeff Loomis" or "Jeff Loomis featuring AE."
He's a great player, but rarely do individual guitarists own the show in metal. They have to be backed/associated with a band/brand.
Back to the headstock--I like the shape, just put 3 on each side for a 6 or 4 on each side for an 8 and fill in the center slot for an arrowhead shape. Simplicity is best.
Andy James is great. He should be in Judas Priest with Ritchie Faulkner now, IMO.
But I most respect Andy as a teacher, when he did a lot of videos for Lick Library with my old teacher Danny Gill.
Danny taught me in person almost 25 years ago at GIT and is one of the best, both as a player and teacher, probably because Danny studied there in the early 80s with Paul Gilbert. Danny and Paul play in a similar style, so it was a great learning experience for me. Via Danny I learned about all the various types of harmonies that later made up most of my style (mainly diatonic vs. non-diatonic minor 3rds). I think the world of that man for sure.
