Instrumental/ No vocals?

[nagpo]

Anyone know if any versions of the songs exist without the vocals? I only ask because I find it hard to hear tremonti sometimes under myles during some chorus moments and I want to focus in on how mark fills in the music. If that makes any sense at all.

[anguyen92]

There are some karaoke covers of some of the singles (Open Your Eyes, Rise Today, Broken Wings). Also, the instructional DVD that Mark and Myles did, Fortress: The Sound and the Story, have all 12 tracks of Fortress (no backup vocals though) in instrumentals.

Edit: I don't know how you feel about other people playing their songs, but there's this guy on youtube, Karl Golden, that did an instrumental cover of Blackbird, Cry of Achilles, and Addicted to Pain and some Slash songs as well amongst others.

[HappyHogJens]

There's original instrumentals available of the 12 Fortress songs, plus Come to Life and Ties That Bind. For the last two there's also guitar only, bass only, drums only and vocals only available. It's all on Youtube I believe.
The Fortress songs aren't however.

EDIT there's no existing way to listen to Mark's isolated vocals though. The Come to Life and Ties That Bind "Vocals Only" versions consist of Both Myles and Mark singing together, not separated.

[Felipesh]

Can someone upload those 12 instrumental tracks?

[Andy92]

Against copyright rules to do that.

[anguyen92]

Pretty much. The only way to get those is to get that Sound and the Story DVD. Don't worry, it's only about $40 bucks and there's bound to be a good amount of stuff on it even if you don't want to watch the lessons.

[Felipesh]

yeah I'm looking forward to buy it

[HappyHogJens]

Tim Tournier got them to put the instrumentals on the DVD in the first place. And since he's a bro, We shouldn't upload that stuff.

[fix]

[TTournier]

Yup thats going to happen

[chtimixeur]

I don't understand why Roadrunner didn't do a special edition package with all the Fortress instrumentals on a second disc.
I'd definitely buy those 4 albums again if I could have the instrumentals. It gives you a new perspective on the album and allows you to focus 100% on the musicianship. Plus, you hear details that didn't stick out the first time. I just love that stuff, but maybe that's just me...

One thing I'd love AB to do is to do what Lamb of God did a few years ago. They had a special edition of the album where you had all the stems (rhythm guitar/lead guitar/bass/drums/vocals...), which allowed the most die hard fans to do a remix of their own.
It's not like these stems have any use once the album is officially released, so this could be a good way to make some extra money for the band, and who knows, we may have some cool amateur remixes here and there on youtube.

[Fish Tacos]

Been a while since I looked up the karaoke versions but iirc there's something funky about them. Almost as if they're recorded versions of the Guitar Pro tabs after someone hit play.

[Ubik]