Russell Allen has been Symphony X's singer since 1995, and is a welcome anomaly within progressive metal. Born in 1971, he joined in time to record The Damnation Game (1995), replacing Rod Tyler, and has since defined what sets the band apart from its contemporaries. The genre usually calls for clean, high tenors with precise diction and controlled delivery. Allen is the opposite: a weighty baritone with a rough timbre and a force that comes more from hard rock and blues than from the progressive school. That gives Michael Romeo's material — already dense with counterpoint and orchestration — an earthly counterweight, a voice that sounds human on top of music that could easily become an academic exercise. His register changed over the years. On the early records the delivery is clean and almost operatic; from Paradise Lost (2007) and above all on Iconoclast (2011) he took up a rawer, more aggressive attack, following the hardening of the band's sound. Outside Symphony X he keeps the Allen/Lande partnership with the Norwegian Jørn Lande, a series of records bringing together two of the most powerful voices in melodic metal, and was part of Adrenaline Mob alongside Mike Portnoy.
Bands they were part of and guest appearances (feat.) on other bands.
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