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Dream Theater => Dream Theater => Topic started by: Super Dude on February 10, 2018, 04:58:12 PM
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It had Chapman stick, it had the incredible instrumental Hell’s Kitchen, greats hooks, soul (see Anna Lee), and it had Derek mf’ing Sherinian. Discuss.
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I respectfully disagree. While I really like FII, it isn't DT's last truly great album.
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence is. I could also argue for Octavarium.
Let's see where this thread takes us. :corn
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This is the least accurate thread subject I have seen in my ~10 years here.
Your criteria is very questionable and limited.
1) One instrument used on one song.
2) One great instrumental, which, even if great, is one song out of a total of 11 total.
3) Great hooks - largely subjective.
4) Soul - again subjective. Having "soul" doesn't make a song any better or more enjoyable.
5) The least talented musician they've had in their line-up, and one they didn't even want for another album.
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Nice to see you again too, Chris. No, I was just giving examples. And actually, soul is important, which is to say albums like 8VM and the ST are devoid of anything I would call a heart. It’s just general wankery. Compare FII, which has soaring vocal harmonies, one of Petrucci’s most emotive solos apart from Voices, and the gradual building awesomeness that is BMS-HK-LitS.
Don’t get me wrong - I think Awake was miles better. But FII is the last album of theirs that still wows me every time I listen to it.
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Hello SD. I was thinking about you recently while having a conversation with Adami about Israel and I recalled you being the other forum Jewish resident(?) and I wasn't sure if you still posted here.
I was just commenting that your examples were thin and subjective, regardless of whether or not I agreed with them (I don't). If you feel it has "heart" I won't argue with you if that is how you identify with the album. 9 times out of 10 I'd rather have good song-writing than heart. All other DT albums have more of the former than FII does.
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If you say so. Which, in your view, is the last great album?
As for my being here, I’m kind of tired of Reddit. I probably still won’t be a regular again, but I plan to pop in every so often.
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What does Reddit have to do with this forum? Disclaimer, I don't know anything about Reddit.
Hmm... I would say ADToE is great, there is a noticeable drop-off with DT12, and I like TA quite a bit, but can't quite put it in the "great" category.
I apologize for being snarky. You came out with a strong opinion and I came back with mine unnecessarily strong.
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Yeah it’s pretty great for a band’s second weakest album.
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What does Reddit have to do with this forum? Disclaimer, I don't know anything about Reddit.
Hmm... I would say ADToE is great, there is a noticeable drop-off with DT12, and I like TA quite a bit, but can't quite put it in the "great" category.
I apologize for being snarky. You came out with a strong opinion and I came back with mine unnecessarily strong.
Oh, Reddit is kind of like a huge forum so I focused most of my social media energy there. Anyway, no worries - this is DTF, we know drama.
Definitely agree that DT12 was a huge drop-off. It’s because of that album that I no longer consider myself a fan per se.
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If you say so. Which, in your view, is the last great album?
The Astonishing.
And Hell's Kitchen is good, but let's call it for what it is: a middle section of a song that didn't fit or flow with the rest of said song, correctly lifted from said song, and with the best part of this instrumental written specifically to tie in with the following song on the album.
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FII is my least favorite DT album so I have to disagree.
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Does that mean that SFAM isn't truly great, because I can't even process that.
I don't even find FII to be a great album. My least favorite album of theirs, other than WDADU.
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Yeah it’s pretty great for a band’s second weakest album.
:lol
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I don't get how people say DT12 is a soul-less album. It actually has some of DT's most soulful moments. The Bigger Picture, Along For The Ride, Illumination Theory have more soul than anything off FII.
When people say DT12 is a drop-off, I completely disagree! It's in my top 3 DT albums.
FII is my least favorite DT album, even though I still like it..
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Welcome back to the forum, Derek.
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Yeah it’s pretty great for a band’s second weakest album.
This.
And SFAM has Jordan! I was blown away by him on that album.
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Welcome back to the forum, Derek.
:P
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FFI is a pretty awesome album. Trial of Tears, Peruvian skies and Lines in the Sand are some pretty solid songs. With that said, FFI is not even in the top 5 for DT in albums that were released after 1999. There could be an argument that their last great album was Six degrees or Octavarium. But I feel that people under appreciate Dramatic turn of Evebts and self titled album. The melodic lines in Surrender to Reason, Bigger Picture and This is the Life are some of DTs best. Here is my top list for Albums released after FFI:
Six Degrees
Metropolis pt 2
Octavarium
DT12
Systematic Chaos
Train of Thoughts
FFI
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I think SFAM is a notch above FII, and on some days I feel SDOIT is even better than SFAM. And then Train of Thought is such a badass record with enough majestic beauty throughout the songs. That's an album where I feel Jordan Rudess really IS amazing. The grand piano on that album is sublime.
When Octavarium came out I was impressed by a lot of the tracks, but the production began to show some mistakes (the undermixed guitar solos), although that album has a few of my favorites like The Root of All Evil, These Walls and of course the epic Octavarium.
Gun against my head, I'd say Train of Thought was the last truly, great, classic DT album.
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Welcome back to the forum, Derek.
:rollin :rollin
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I don't get how people say DT12 is a soul-less album. It actually has some of DT's most soulful moments. The Bigger Picture, Along For The Ride, Illumination Theory have more soul than anything off FII.
When people say DT12 is a drop-off, I completely disagree! It's in my top 3 DT albums.
FII is my least favorite DT album, even though I still like it..
This!
FII is not bad at all, but it's still one of my least favorite DT albums.
Last great DT album? The Astonishing.
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Actually FII is the only case in which my least favourite album from a band happens to be enjoyable (and original too).
Last great DT album? The Astonishing.
Yes!!
And also.. DT12 is amazing :metal
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I'm another one who thinks the last great album DT have released is The Astonishing.
FII is good but not one of the top DT albums...
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I'm not as surprised by the relative dislike of FII as I am of the love for The Astonishing.
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Was it mushrooms, LSD, or something I haven’t heard of yet?
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Some great songs (Peruvian Skies, Trial Of Tears, Lines In The Sand and Hells Kitchen)
One very good one (New Millennium)
The rest are pretty average, even (dare I say it) boring by DT standards.
Patchy album for me but still probably 40 min plus of excellent stuff which is what most bands put out as a full album so can't complain. Not as good as SFAM though so cannot be called their last great album imo.
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Truly great album? Absolutely! The "last" truly great DT album? Not remotely. At least 7 of the 9 that came after it are even greater, and some by a wide margin. That doesn't take away from how good FII is. It's just that they have done even better, and have done so MANY times over.
As for the specific examples, I don't really agree with most.
Chapman stick: Okay. Pretty cool. But it doesn't really do much to make the album any more special.
Hell's Kitchen: Perhaps the weakest instrumental on a studio album from them. I'm not sure why they made it into a "song" once it was scrapped from Burning My Soul.
Great hooks: Yeah.
Soul: Sure.
Sherinian: He did fine. I like his contributions. But he has always been my least favorite DT keyboardist.
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The Astonishing as the last great album for me as well. :)
I do love Hell's Kitchen though. Not more than the other instrumentals, but I think it's beautiful.
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Truly great album? Absolutely! The "last" truly great DT album? Not remotely. At least 7 of the 9 that came after it are even greater, and some by a wide margin. That doesn't take away from how good FII is. It's just that they have done even better, and have done so MANY times over.
As for the specific examples, I don't really agree with most.
Chapman stick: Okay. Pretty cool. But it doesn't really do much to make the album any more special.
Hell's Kitchen: Perhaps the weakest instrumental on a studio album from them. I'm not sure why they made it into a "song" once it was scrapped from Burning My Soul.
Great hooks: Yeah.
Soul: Sure.
Sherinian: He did fine. I like his contributions. But he has always been my least favorite DT keyboardist.
I was wondering how long it’d be before you found your way here. :lol
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Bzzzzzzt! 6DOIT was peak DT.
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It had Chapman stick
A vaguely interesting novelty that really didn't add much.
it had the incredible instrumental Hell’s Kitchen
I'll agree with that, but I would argue that it's no better than DT's fourth best instrumental.
greats hooks
I disagree. For me, it's a largely unmemorable album.
soul (see Anna Lee)
I like Anna Lee just fine, but it's nothing great.
and it had Derek mf’ing Sherinian.
Whoop-de-f'ing-doo.
Here's the thing, even if I were to agree on all of the points you made, you haven't made a case why it's "the last truly great DT album." Are you suggesting that SFAM and SDOIT aren't great? Or are they "great" but not "truly great" (which would mean they're what..."falsely great")? Ultimately, to say an album is or isn't "great" is nothing but a subjective opinion. I generally think SFAM is DT's best album, but that doesn't mean I don't think several of their subsequent albums are "great."
As far a FII, I think it generally lacks balls and is mostly uninteresting. I typically rank it in the bottom 3-4 DT albums.
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Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
I fucking agree completely, this is actually something I've been saying for a long time.
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Here's the thing, even if I were to agree on all of the points you made, you haven't made a case why it's "the last truly great DT album." Are you suggesting that SFAM and SDOIT aren't great? Or are they "great" but not "truly great" (which would mean they're what..."falsely great")? Ultimately, to say an album is or isn't "great" is nothing but a subjective opinion. I generally think SFAM is DT's best album, but that doesn't mean I don't think several of their subsequent albums are "great."
As far a FII, I think it generally lacks balls and is mostly uninteresting. I typically rank it in the bottom 3-4 DT albums.
Interesting you should say that, because yeah, I do generally draw the line at SFAM. It’s so...average. And every album since then has been one unadulterated wankfest after another. Being meh-tul or complex does not make the music intricate or interesting by necessity.
What made Awake interesting was how seamlessly DT had incorporated the then-current grunge sound into their prog metal repertoire. Now that is a fresh take. On the other hand, the self-titled sounds exactly like everything the band has done since at least 2005. I will say this at least for The Astonishing: it dared to be different. I may not like the result, but at least they tried to shake up the formula.
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I respectfully disagree. While I really like FII, it isn't DT's last truly great album.
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence is. I could also argue for Octavarium.
Let's see where this thread takes us. :corn
This. Saved me the time to write it.
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Here's the thing, even if I were to agree on all of the points you made, you haven't made a case why it's "the last truly great DT album." Are you suggesting that SFAM and SDOIT aren't great? Or are they "great" but not "truly great" (which would mean they're what..."falsely great")? Ultimately, to say an album is or isn't "great" is nothing but a subjective opinion. I generally think SFAM is DT's best album, but that doesn't mean I don't think several of their subsequent albums are "great."
As far a FII, I think it generally lacks balls and is mostly uninteresting. I typically rank it in the bottom 3-4 DT albums.
Interesting you should say that, because yeah, I do generally draw the line at SFAM. It’s so...average. And every album since then has been one unadulterated wankfest after another. Being meh-tul or complex does not make the music intricate or interesting by necessity.
Well...you didn't really clarify what you're talking about. Sounds like you're suggesting that an album is only "truly great" if it is somehow novel or unique or not like anything else in the artist's catalog. As far as SFAM, like it or don't like it; think that FII is better if you want; but there's nothing even remotely "average" about SFAM.
What made Awake interesting was how seamlessly DT had incorporated the then-current grunge sound into their prog metal repertoire. Now that is a fresh take.
I don't think Awake is even remotely grungy (with the possible exception of Lie and The Mirror, neither of which I particularly like). In fact, I would argue that FII is more "grungy," which makes sense given that they tried to write a more "commercial" album, and grunge was hot in the 90s.
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This is the least accurate thread subject I have seen in my ~10 years here.
Your criteria is very questionable and limited.
1) One instrument used on one song.
2) One great instrumental, which, even if great, is one song out of a total of 11 total.
3) Great hooks - largely subjective.
4) Soul - again subjective. Having "soul" doesn't make a song any better or more enjoyable.
5) The least talented musician they've had in their line-up, and one they didn't even want for another album.
I agree.
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To me, FII has stood against the test of time. It's aged pretty well and it's the DT that I keep coming back the most.
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You say the Last truly great album. Well, I think all the albums are Great! (I don't include WDADU -no JLB) Each is different and obviously I have favorites as anyone would, but that is fluid. The complaint of wankery and whatever else starting with SFOM, makes me think you really were never into DT that much anyway. So back to the comtment to Last Great Album. It is The Astonishing, because it is their last album and they are all Great. And lest a huge flop (highly unlikely), the next album will be the Last truly great album.
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FFI is a pretty awesome album. Trial of Tears, Peruvian skies and Lines in the Sand are some pretty solid songs. With that said, FFI is not even in the top 5 for DT in albums that were released after 1999. There could be an argument that their last great album was Six degrees or Octavarium. But I feel that people under appreciate Dramatic turn of Evebts and self titled album. The melodic lines in Surrender to Reason, Bigger Picture and This is the Life are some of DTs best. Here is my top list for Albums released after FFI:
Six Degrees
Metropolis pt 2
Octavarium
DT12
Systematic Chaos
Train of Thoughts
FFI
Falling Finfo Infinity?
Also, I think everyone's forgetting SFAM exists
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Also, I think everyone's forgetting SFAM exists
By "everyone," you mean almost no one who's posted in this thread. Right?
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To me, FII has stood against the test of time. It's aged pretty well and it's the DT that I keep coming back the most.
Mah boi! :tup
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Musically I'd go for Six Degrees and then Falling into Infinity (the non-official version, though).
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I disagree, I think it is The Astonishing.
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The Astonishing is tied for 1st place for me with Octavarium and DT12.
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In my opinion:
Scenes: Great
Six Degrees: Great
Train: Has great moments; don't usually listen to in full
Octavarium: Very good
Chaos: Has great moments; don't usually listen to in full
Clouds: Has great moments; don't usually listen to in full
Dramatic Turn: Very good
DT12: Very good
Astonishing: Very good when I'm in the mood
Clearly, I disagree with the OP! :biggrin:
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Yay more album rating! :laugh:
Scenes: Great!!!!
Six Degrees: Great!!!!
Train: Ehhhh
Octavarium: Great!!!!!
Chaos: Great!!!!
Clouds: Great!!!!!
Dramatic Turn: Ehhhhh
DT12: Ehhhhhh
Astonishing: GREAT!!!!!!!
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Very well.
SFAM: Okay
SDOIT: Good
ToT: Yuck
8VM: Gooder but not great
SC: Meh
BCSL: Meh
ADToE: Good
DT12: Yuck
TA: It’s...astonishing this saw the light of day! (Laugh track)
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SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps. But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments. But probably not a "great album" on balance. One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.
The defense rests. :biggrin:
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Also, I think everyone's forgetting SFAM exists
By "everyone," you mean almost no one who's posted in this thread. Right?
I Ctrl-F'd "SFAM" & "Scenes" when I posted that (on the actual posting page) & it yielded no results for some reason. Idk why but it's working now. :\
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SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps. But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments. But probably not a "great album" on balance. One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.
The defense rests. :biggrin:
Joke's on you, we're arguing in equity!
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Joke's on you, we're arguing in equity!
Coincidentally, "Arguing in Equity" will be the title of DT14. You heard it here first! :eek
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SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps. But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments. But probably not a "great album" on balance. One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.
The defense rests. :biggrin:
Joke's on you, we're arguing in equity!
???
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SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps. But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments. But probably not a "great album" on balance. One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.
The defense rests. :biggrin:
I pretty much agree with this to a T. Except I like Black Clouds more than SC and would actually put BC in the great category, with SC getting almost great. :) Everything else is pretty much dead on. :)
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SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps. But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments. But probably not a "great album" on balance. One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.
The defense rests. :biggrin:
Joke's on you, we're arguing in equity!
???
It’s a law joke (bosk and one other person who I don’t think is active here anymore were a mentor to me while I was in law school). Sorry.
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And a mighty fine law joke, I might add. :clap:
And I'm flattered that you would consider me having been a "mentor" of sorts. I felt like my bad side, which came out too often for me to be happy with in retrospect, might have been more offputting than mentorish. Not sure whether the good outweighed the bad for you, or whether just the passage of time has blunted your memory of the bad. But either way, it's nice to know that you choose to focus on the positive.
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FII is my least favorite DT album so I have to disagree.
Nail on the head.
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Unfortunately, that is spot on. There were a few after that that I really liked, namely Octavarium, Systematic Chaos and Dramatic Turn, but the change in keyboard sounds and approach (as incredibly talented as Jordan Rudass is) never fully jived with me. And now with Petrucci being 100% in charge of songwrting and production I'm not sure there will be much again that'll work for me.
A lot of it was pretty decent still, but the last two albums, Scenes from a Memory and Six Degrees I find for the most part unlistenable and cringeworthy.
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And now with Petrucci being 100% in charge of songwrting and production
That's not true. I need to check the booklets to be certain but James wrote a couple songs on ADTOE, Myung wrote lyrics to at least one song that I can think of since MP's departure, and JR shared songwriting duties with John for The Astonishing. He might be in charge of the bulk but he's not the sole composer or lyricist.
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And a mighty fine law joke, I might add. :clap:
And I'm flattered that you would consider me having been a "mentor" of sorts. I felt like my bad side, which came out too often for me to be happy with in retrospect, might have been more offputting than mentorish. Not sure whether the good outweighed the bad for you, or whether just the passage of time has blunted your memory of the bad. But either way, it's nice to know that you choose to focus on the positive.
Thanks bosk. I’m definitely one to focus on the positives, which is why I pretend albums after FII don’t exist. :biggrin:
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Nah mate
Nah mate
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence mate
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I'd say Six Degrees was the last great DT album.
But Falling into Infinity is also great. Listening to it now.
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It had Chapman stick, it had the incredible instrumental Hell’s Kitchen, greats hooks, soul (see Anna Lee), and it had Derek mf’ing Sherinian. Discuss.
Agree. I have not liked Dream Theater nearly as much once DS was canned, and JR was hired. DT became LTE with vocals to my ear. I still like them, but nowhere near as much. They lost a lot lyrically and sonically when Kevin left. DS helped infuse a little Jon Lord inspired keys and that was cool, even if lyrically something was off a bit. But it was still cool. Would have loved to have seen where DT would have went with DS still in the band for another album.
But as time has shown, the keyboardist in Dream Theater is integral to their songwriting and sound, and unfortunately, I just don't connect as much with Jordan (even though I respect him a great deal).
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It had Chapman stick, it had the incredible instrumental Hell’s Kitchen, greats hooks, soul (see Anna Lee), and it had Derek mf’ing Sherinian. Discuss.
Agree. I have not liked Dream Theater nearly as much once DS was canned, and JR was hired. DT became LTE with vocals to my ear. I still like them, but nowhere near as much. They lost a lot lyrically and sonically when Kevin left. DS helped infuse a little Jon Lord inspired keys and that was cool, even if lyrically something was off a bit. But it was still cool. Would have loved to have seen where DT would have went with DS still in the band for another album.
But as time has shown, the keyboardist in Dream Theater is integral to their songwriting and sound, and unfortunately, I just don't connect as much with Jordan (even though I respect him a great deal).
Yeah boi! :hat :metal
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I suppose I should consider myself lucky. I love Jordan. :)
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DT sounds nothing like LTE to me. I can't listen to more than 3 minutes of LTE but I am generally not interested in instrumental acts, so that is my personal preference. I don't think DS added anything noteworthy to FII, and I doubt he would have if he stayed with them.
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I don't think DS added anything noteworthy to FII, and I doubt he would have if he stayed with them.
I think the same way. The only keyboard highlight to me on FII is THAT solo on Trial of Tears, but the rest is pretty meh.
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Agree. I have not liked Dream Theater nearly as much once DS was canned, and JR was hired.
Try not to think of it like this. Rudess was who they wanted from the get-go but wasn't available so they went with Sherinian. So when Rudess then became available Sherinian was bumped. I do remember hearing LTE and also the one-time live show they did with Rudess thinking how awesome it would be to have Rudess in the band and then like a month later it happened... and this was before I knew too much of the post-Moore keyboard adventures.
As for rankings, I really don't participate in them, I find it shallow to rank art vs art, particularly within the same artist, I have no problem saying what I personally prefer, but that can also change depending on where my head is at, but I mostly "rank" them all equal cuz they represent a time in my life and theirs that means something for that period.
I also think this conversation would be different had FII been the double album w/ACoS (and/or demo versions) they wanted initially.
My only gripe with FII is the Chapman stick. Unless it's your main thing (Tony Levin), it's just stupid. It was a gimmick they tried when they were trying absolutely everything (which I mostly enjoyed this diversity and experimentation) to please the suits and Myung plays it like a regular bass for most of the song anyway.
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The last 3 albums as well as SDOIT have all been amazing IMO.
I do enjoy several tracks from FII, and the mix is clearer than some others so that's a plus! Derek's most noteworthy contributions for me are on LITS and Trial of Tears. I am actually glad he left because he's released a lot of other albums which are more interesting than what he did in DT. Could he have done that anyway? Sure, but it may have been less likely and taken longer.
FII isn't my least favorite album...I'd probably put it somewhere in the middle.
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Agree. I have not liked Dream Theater nearly as much once DS was canned, and JR was hired.
I also think this conversation would be different had FII been the double album w/ACoS (and/or demo versions) they wanted initially.
Good point. If it had been released sounding like the demo versions, I would have discarded it as inane, over-bloated garbage. :biggrin:
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had FII been the double album w/ACoS (and/or demo versions) they wanted initially.
I would have discarded it as inane, over-bloated garbage. :biggrin:
I hate to think of anything with ACoS on it as garbage (though I have a low opinion of the EP), but I can't disagree with this.
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Good point. If it had been released sounding like the demo versions, I would have discarded it as inane, over-bloated garbage. :biggrin:
How do you go from it being the "last truly great DT album" as it was released to the complete opposite if it was released as initially planned?
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Because as the songs were initially written, they were a mess. Shockingly, sometimes outside input is actually important to creating a quality work.
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Because as the songs were initially written, they were a mess. Shockingly, sometimes outside input is actually important to creating a quality work.
This. I agree with basically all the decisions made during the process.
I agree that Burning My Soul flows better as a standard rocking song without the need to derail it for a couple of minutes. Also, unintended good consequences - by creating Hell's Kitchen, they wrote the best part of the song, the ending, to make it connect to Lines in the Sand.
I agree that Hollow Years flows better with the bridge shortened and streamlined.
I agree that, if you really have to have a catchy song, You Not Me is catchier than You Or Me.
I agree that it didn't need to be a double album, especially knowing now that we would have gotten Scenes from a Memory after.
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I will admit I have a slight preference for You Or Me, but You Not Me is not the great abomination to art and music everyone acts like it is.
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Indeed. It's biggest failing is that it didn't sound like DT. And for fans at the time, coming off of I&W and Awake, if you are going to diverge from the sound that has built you up in to one of the genre's flagship bands, you damn well better write something better than You Not Me.
That being said, at the time, when I listened to FII, I only ever listened to YNM-PS-HY and AL-ToT.
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No love for Just Let Me Breathe or Take Away My Pain?
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No love for Just Let Me Breathe or Take Away My Pain?
They're cool. The Once in a Livetime version of Take Away my Pain is excellent though.
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I will admit I have a slight preference for You Or Me, but You Not Me is not the great abomination to art and music everyone acts like it is.
Keep the awesome keyboard section of You Or Me and keep the chorus of You Not Me.
Derek has some great keyboard moments that are on the non album demos and sections they cut for the songs that made it on the album. They show more of his different keyboard sounds.
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Because as the songs were initially written, they were a mess. Shockingly, sometimes outside input is actually important to creating a quality work.
THANK YOU. I see all the time all this crap about artists having control over their own stuff, and while I support that to a degree, I am of the opinion DT absolutely needed (and still does) a full-on producer suggesting thing and bringing a fresh perspective. I for one think the changes made to FII are exactly what the album needed. I would love to have had a double album, as I love the other tracks written for FII, but the songs on the album as it stands were not as good as demos. The changes made to them IMPROVE things (for example, lifting Hell's Kitchen out of Burning My Soul -- that was EXACTLY what was needed, at least to my ear).
I will admit I have a slight preference for You Or Me, but You Not Me is not the great abomination to art and music everyone acts like it is.
I am a fan of You Not Me. It did very well on radio, and was a nice blend of commercial hard rock/prog. It isn't my top-3 on the record, but I really think it gets a bad rap. I actually think it is much better than You Or Me. That tune needed work, and it got it with the changes made.
No love for Just Let Me Breathe or Take Away My Pain?
They are what they are. I am not a big fan of JLMB, but I am very much looking forward to seeing it played live again with Sons of Apollo. I like the sentiment behind Take Away My Pain for sure, and respect what JP was going through. But it isn't one of my favorites from that record.
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THANK YOU. I see all the time all this crap about artists having control over their own stuff, and while I support that to a degree, I am of the opinion DT absolutely needed (and still does) a full-on producer suggesting thing and bringing a fresh perspective.
Indeed, for example, while we know MP offered three solutions to the dilemma, it was a producer job to sort out the issues with the "Day after day" infamous section of A Nightmare to Remember. I'm not sure what *I* would have came up with, but an external producer would have suggested something.
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THANK YOU. I see all the time all this crap about artists having control over their own stuff, and while I support that to a degree, I am of the opinion DT absolutely needed (and still does) a full-on producer suggesting thing and bringing a fresh perspective.
Indeed, for example, while we know MP offered three solutions to the dilemma, it was a producer job to sort out the issues with the "Day after day" infamous section of A Nightmare to Remember. I'm not sure what *I* would have came up with, but an external producer would have suggested something.
I don't know why the Michael Akerfeldt(?) feature was denied. I mean, I get the argument that they couldn't do it live if they did that, but it's not like it'd destroy the song by having a sample. By that logic, Home should've never been played live unless they got the actors who did the sex sound effects to do them live.
(not that I would've complained or anything :eyebrows:)
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I would go with Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence. Hell, I would even go with ADTOE if there wasn't a track called "Build me up Break Me Down" on that CD.
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Indeed, for example, while we know MP offered three solutions to the dilemma, it was a producer job to sort out the issues with the "Day after day" infamous section of A Nightmare to Remember. I'm not sure what *I* would have came up with, but an external producer would have suggested something.
Hopefully he would have suggested something along the lines of "Let's have the singer handle the vocals."
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By that logic, Home should've never been played live unless they got the actors who did the sex sound effects to do them live.
It's cool, they just had James do it instead.
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Indeed, for example, while we know MP offered three solutions to the dilemma, it was a producer job to sort out the issues with the "Day after day" infamous section of A Nightmare to Remember. I'm not sure what *I* would have came up with, but an external producer would have suggested something.
Hopefully he would have suggested something along the lines of "Let's have the singer handle the vocals."
So much truth in such a short post :lol
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I think SFAM is DT's greatest album, but it is a bit one-dimensional, so I can see why people might not agree. 6DOIT is great, but that title track is just too long, it bores me before I get to the end. 8VM is also brilliant, but there are some duff moments.
I love FII. If you like that more mellow, atmospheric side of the band (I do), they've never really done anything like it since. I can see why the OP would argue that FII is the band's last great album, but for me it has moments of weakness.
So, in conclusion, the last truly great DT album was - Awake.
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I think SFAM is DT's greatest album, but it is a bit one-dimensional, so I can see why people might not agree. 6DOIT is great, but that title track is just too long, it bores me before I get to the end. 8VM is also brilliant, but there are some duff moments.
I love FII. If you like that more mellow, atmospheric side of the band (I do), they've never really done anything like it since. I can see why the OP would argue that FII is the band's last great album, but for me it has moments of weakness.
So, in conclusion, the last truly great DT album was - Awake.
Well played. :lol
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FII had a musicality that the latter albums lacked. I find it generally more listenable. I always thought that once they brought JR aboard their music became colder, and focused more on chops than music. I'm not sure I agree with Super Jew, the next two albums absolutely qualify as great in my book, but he's certainly correct that it marked the end of an era. Their new direction started off very well but really set the course for a steady decline.
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FII had a musicality that the latter albums lacked. I find it generally more listenable. I always thought that once they brought JR aboard their music became colder, and focused more on chops than music. I'm not sure I agree with Super Jew, the next two albums absolutely qualify as great in my book, but he's certainly correct that it marked the end of an era. Their new direction started off very well but really set the course for a steady decline.
Spot-on. Very well said. I was still on board with SFAM and Six Degrees, but found my interest waning. ToT was good too, but I basically just checked out after that, despite seeing various tours. I bought all the albums, but rarely listen to anything post-FII (and Cleaning out the Closet) these days.
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6D was the last great for me. TOT's trying so hard to be heavy it sounds super-unconvincing. And they rarely shook elements of that off until MP left. 8VM was 2/3rds terrific but yeah. 6D.
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FII had a musicality that the latter albums lacked. I find it generally more listenable. I always thought that once they brought JR aboard their music became colder, and focused more on chops than music. I'm not sure I agree with Super Jew, the next two albums absolutely qualify as great in my book, but he's certainly correct that it marked the end of an era. Their new direction started off very well but really set the course for a steady decline.
It's strange that you use the word "colder". I realize how different people can see things because FII always represents a very "cold" album for me. The production lacks warmth as it sounds very clean and "cold" even if it's great. Except for some few great songs, most of them lack personality and any kind of heart for me. Scenes From a Memory and SDOIT are very warm and colorful when I think about them. FII really represents a clinically correct album and partly therefore sometimes joyless album for me, something that thankfully the next one was full of.
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And it’s funny because I hear just the opposite: FII was the last album before mindless wankery took over. It had harmonies, for God’s sake, HARMONIES!
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And it’s funny because I hear just the opposite: FII was the last album before mindless wankery took over. It had harmonies, for God’s sake, HARMONIES!
YES! Fully agree with you.
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I actually really appreciate the topic. Saying FII is the last great album with Scenes being the sequel is unusual :D
However back to subject. FII is just not a master at anything for me. Scenes IS a master even if it's not everyone's cup of tea. Not sure if the music on Scenes is "wankery" but if it is I certainly love DT with "wankery" more than DT with "harmonies" and restrictions. Even the opener Overture 1928 feels like a lion released from Zoo.
I also can't help to wonder how Trail of Tears can't be "wankery"? Half the song is pretty much instrument solo "wankery" IMO. I love that song and the absolute highlight of FII for me ;)
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I actually really appreciate the topic. Saying FII is the last great album with Scenes being the sequel is unusual :D
However back to subject. FII is just not a master at anything for me. Scenes IS a master even if it's not everyone's cup of tea. Not sure if the music on Scenes is "wankery" but if it is I certainly love DT with "wankery" more than DT with "harmonies" and restrictions. Even the opener Overture 1928 feels like a lion released from Zoo.
I also can't help to wonder how Trail of Tears can't be "wankery"? Half the song is pretty much instrument solo "wankery" IMO. I love that song and the absolute highlight of FII for me ;)
I literally agree with all of this :tup :tup :tup
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I know a few DT fans that would agree with this thread title. I am one of them.
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And it’s funny because I hear just the opposite: FII was the last album before mindless wankery took over. It had harmonies, for God’s sake, HARMONIES!
Amen to this!
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And it’s funny because I hear just the opposite: FII was the last album before mindless wankery took over. It had harmonies, for God’s sake, HARMONIES!
Amen to this!
We should start a "Falling into Infinity Fans only" thread. LOL.
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I'm pretty confident that every DT album has harmonies. (I wasn't sure about WDADU, then decided to check using Afterlife and yep, they're there)
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And it’s funny because I hear just the opposite: FII was the last album before mindless wankery took over. It had harmonies, for God’s sake, HARMONIES!
I don’t understand the harmony comment. If you’re talking vocal harmonies, Home, Forsaken, A Nightmare to Remember, and Our New World all have some of the band’s best harmonies. If you’re talking instruments, Beyond this Life, The Great Debate, Endless Sacrifice, Octavarium, In the Presence of Enemies, The Count of Tuscany, Breaking All Illusions, Illumination Theory, and A New Beginning all have plenty of harmonies in their instrumental sections. That’s just a few songs of many and they all came out after FII.
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I would say he meant more melodies (melodic) than wankery. The post MP albums have a much lower degree of wankery and have been more melodic compares to the last few MP albums.
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Because as the songs were initially written, they were a mess. Shockingly, sometimes outside input is actually important to creating a quality work.
I still don't understand how you go from "best thing ever" to "garbage".
If you said you prefer the final released album over a double-CD or other track choices cuz it's tighter and not bloated and such then I'd understand but to call a double-CD version "garbage" when you praise the actual version so highly doesn't make sense to me. At the very least they're similar and could be considered "slightly" or "moderately" better than the other but to go from "heaven" to "hell" is extreme to say the least.
Personally, I think a single-CD but with different tracks would have been the way to go. I'd leave off the "emo angst" tracks such as Just Let Me Breathe and Burning My Soul in favour of Where Are You Now and Raise The Knife and I really don't care much for New Millennium and would rather have had The Way It Used To Be and let's not forget about Speak To Me in place of Anna Lee.
The one thing I truly miss from the FII days are the demos and the crafting of the songs.
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Because as the songs were initially written, they were a mess. Shockingly, sometimes outside input is actually important to creating a quality work.
I still don't understand how you go from "best thing ever" to "garbage".
If you said you prefer the final released album over a double-CD or other track choices cuz it's tighter and not bloated and such then I'd understand but to call a double-CD version "garbage" when you praise the actual version so highly doesn't make sense to me. At the very least they're similar and could be considered "slightly" or "moderately" better than the other but to go from "heaven" to "hell" is extreme to say the least.
Personally, I think a single-CD but with different tracks would have been the way to go. I'd leave off the "emo angst" tracks such as Just Let Me Breathe and Burning My Soul in favour of Where Are You Now and Raise The Knife and I really don't care much for New Millennium and would rather have had The Way It Used To Be and let's not forget about Speak To Me in place of Anna Lee.
The one thing I truly miss from the FII days are the demos and the crafting of the songs.
See above:
Because as the songs were initially written, they were a mess. Shockingly, sometimes outside input is actually important to creating a quality work.
This. I agree with basically all the decisions made during the process.
I agree that Burning My Soul flows better as a standard rocking song without the need to derail it for a couple of minutes. Also, unintended good consequences - by creating Hell's Kitchen, they wrote the best part of the song, the ending, to make it connect to Lines in the Sand.
I agree that Hollow Years flows better with the bridge shortened and streamlined.
I agree that, if you really have to have a catchy song, You Not Me is catchier than You Or Me.
I agree that it didn't need to be a double album, especially knowing now that we would have gotten Scenes from a Memory after.
Ditching input from the label/studio worked alright for SFAM and SDOIT, but it would have been a disaster for FII and has been a disaster for DT ever since ToT or so. The original Hollow Years pre-chorus was unnecessary, Hell's Kitchen had no business being inside BMS, Take Away My Pain was just terrible until it basically underwent a total rewrite, and the chorus of You Or Me was not as kicking as the one used in You Not Me (not to mention the cringey bridge). Also, the Metropolis Pt. II demo was not that good. I may not like SFAM all that much, but Metropolis was much better as a fleshed-out album than it would've been as a song.
And you can see evidence that it would've been a disaster for FII from the way ToT sounds like a hodgepodge of jams that don't make coherent songs. How every album since then has had the same guitar-keyboard tradeoff solos. The total lack of interesting vocals. The gradual increase of cheese. At least early DT balanced the cheese with some attempt to sound current.
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Take Away My Pain was just terrible until it basically underwent a total rewrite
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DWrY78GVQAAo2jM.jpg:large)
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Raise The Knife was the only loss, the Score version shows how great the song could have sounded, if they had recorded a studio version.
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Raise The Knife was the only loss, the Score version shows how great the song could have sounded, if they had recorded a studio version.
Raise the Knife and Speak to Me, the rest are just meh (like most of FII, anyway).
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ToT sounds like a hodgepodge of jams that don't make coherent songs.
You're kidding, right?
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ToT sounds like a hodgepodge of jams that don't make coherent songs.
You're kidding, right?
I'm serious, and don't call me Kidding.
Raise The Knife was the only loss, the Score version shows how great the song could have sounded, if they had recorded a studio version.
Raise the Knife and Speak to Me, the rest are just meh (like most of FII, anyway).
Raise the Knife could've been good, yeah. I'm not a fan of Speak to Me, but I feel like a reworked Cover My Eyes might've had promise. Another grungy single.
Take Away My Pain was just terrible until it basically underwent a total rewrite
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DWrY78GVQAAo2jM.jpg:large)
John Petrucci's draft of Take Away My Pain is not good. It certainly didn't make me feel anything, which I assumed was his intent.
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The electric version of Cover My Eyes is pretty generic. It was like 74 times better played acoustically.
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More like 74 million. Wasn't Cover My Eyes one of the songs JP wrote when the record label asked for more material? It totally sounds like someone who was of the mindset of "Well, I just wrote a bunch of material, I don't have any new ideas right now.... here's a song."
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Almost forgot that Raise The Knife was scrapped for FII. Has anyone said why? Not sure how well The Score version represents the version they wrote for FII but if it's the same I can't understand why songs like You Not Me, Take Away My Pain, Burning My Soul, Anna Lee etc. was preferred. It has a catchy sound and I think fans would have loved it! I think it has "harmonies" as well ;)
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Yeah, Cover My Eyes does sound like a song that was written in 20 minutes. Not that there's anything wrong with that, just that the 'quickie' nature of it doesn't really fit anywhere in DT's discography :lol
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I guess I'm in the minority when I say that I think RtK is one of their worst 10+ minute songs. Musically it is ok, but the vocal melodies are beyond awful and really ruin the song for me. It's literally my least favorite song from the entire FII sessions and doesn't hold a candle to LiTS or ToT.
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To my ears, Raise the Knife had potential, but it is clearly a demo. It needed a lot more work.
Cover My Eyes is a crossover song. Simplistic, meant for radio, it would and could have worked. Speak to Me is a great track, and honestly should have been on the record.
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One thing that I feel is never mentioned about FII is, they added a lot of tiny things in the background. E.g. 2:13 in New Millennium, Derek is scraping over piano wires.
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To my ears, Raise the Knife had potential, but it is clearly a demo. It needed a lot more work.
Cover My Eyes is a crossover song. Simplistic, meant for radio, it would and could have worked. Speak to Me is a great track, and honestly should have been on the record.
All of this except for the part about Speak to Me. I don’t hate it I guess, it just doesn’t add anything.
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All this stuff about how the track list for FII should have been different makes me wonder even more how FII could have been a "truly great DT album." Of course, that term still hasn't been clearly defined. Nor has it been explained why none of the nine subsequent albums qualify as "truly great" (other than the comments that those nine albums contain "wankery" that wasn't present (to the same degree) on FII, but which has been part of DT's sound since the very beginning).
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Cover My Eyes is a crossover song. Simplistic, meant for radio, it would and could have worked.
Then don't you have that thing happen where someone buys the album based on that one song on they heard on the radio, then they get pissed off when the rest of the album sounds nothing like that one song? Bands don't always complain about more people buying their albums and going to their concerts, though some do. It's just questionable whether or not that is a good long term strategy.
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Cover My Eyes is a crossover song. Simplistic, meant for radio, it would and could have worked.
Then don't you have that thing happen where someone buys the album based on that one song on they heard on the radio, then they get pissed off when the rest of the album sounds nothing like that one song? Bands don't always complain about more people buying their albums and going to their concerts, though some do. It's just questionable whether or not that is a good long term strategy.
If the song gets you in front of a lot more people, that's a good thing. Hugely successful bands have had that issue, and done just fine. Metallica immediately comes to mind with Nothing Else Matters, Kansas with Dust in the Wind, Queensryche with Silent Lucidity, even DT with Solitary Shell (which they stupidly refused to play on live TV which to this day I think was a really bad mistake).
Sure, there are some risks you take, but hey, back in 1997, if impulse buying off of one song pushed your record from 250,000 to gold, or from 600,000 to platinum, you take that every single time, and deal with the consequences later.
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Take Away My Pain was just terrible until it basically underwent a total rewrite
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DWrY78GVQAAo2jM.jpg:large)
Yeah and even at that it still wasn't fully awesome until they played it live. Thats when the song became an amazing emotional song about JP's dad.
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All this stuff about how the track list for FII should have been different makes me wonder even more how FII could have been a "truly great DT album." Of course, that term still hasn't been clearly defined. Nor has it been explained why none of the nine subsequent albums qualify as "truly great" (other than the comments that those nine albums contain "wankery" that wasn't present (to the same degree) on FII, but which has been part of DT's sound since the very beginning).
Truly great doesn’t have to mean the most perfect thing to ever exist. FII as released is a great, solid album that could’ve been made better if some of the b-sided had been fine-tuned for final release. But it’s still a great album in its own right.
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To my ears, Raise the Knife had potential, but it is clearly a demo. It needed a lot more work.
Cover My Eyes is a crossover song. Simplistic, meant for radio, it would and could have worked. Speak to Me is a great track, and honestly should have been on the record.
Now I'm starting to wonder how different the Demos would be if those songs got worked on to be on the album. One song that would've been way different is Where Are You Now? I love that demo as is but I'm sure that Keys/Guitar solo melody would appear only one time.
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Truly great doesn’t have to mean the most perfect thing to ever exist. FII as released is a great, solid album that could’ve been made better if some of the b-sided had been fine-tuned for final release. But it’s still a great album in its own right.
Ok, but I still don't understand the original premise of this thread. What does "truly great" mean (other than that it means something less than perfect), and why does FII meet that definition but none of the subsequent albums do.
If you're just saying that you subjectively prefer FII to anything DT has done since, then I'll leave it at that, except to say that I obviously have a different subjective opinion.
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...and why does FII meet that definition but none of the subsequent albums do.
I prefer to just recognize this is just another instance of how people like to post the most benign subjective opinions online, but presented in the most edgy controversial ways possible because it somehow feels good to post opinions in a way that appears to belittle the opinions of anyone who doesn't agree.
If you're just saying that you subjectively prefer FII to anything DT has done since, then I'll leave it at that, except to say that I obviously have a different subjective opinion.
Pretty much.
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...and why does FII meet that definition but none of the subsequent albums do.
I prefer to just recognize this is just another instance of how people like to post the most benign subjective opinions online, but presented in the most edgy controversial ways possible because it somehow feels good to post opinions in a way that appears to belittle the opinions of anyone who doesn't agree.
If you're just saying that you subjectively prefer FII to anything DT has done since, then I'll leave it at that, except to say that I obviously have a different subjective opinion.
Pretty much.
Oh you. :-*
Heck, I’m just glad I’m not the only one who feels this way.
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To each their own with their opinions on FII but to me, TA blows it out of the water so I personally disagree with the OP
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...and why does FII meet that definition but none of the subsequent albums do.
I prefer to just recognize this is just another instance of how people like to post the most benign subjective opinions online, but presented in the most edgy controversial ways possible because it somehow feels good to post opinions in a way that appears to belittle the opinions of anyone who doesn't agree.
If you're just saying that you subjectively prefer FII to anything DT has done since, then I'll leave it at that, except to say that I obviously have a different subjective opinion.
Pretty much.
So...basically, this thread should have been titled, "I love FII and don't like DT's subsequent releases (or don't like them as much as FII)." :tup
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First off, most of the threads in the DT side are merely excuses to splooge DT related Smiles all over people's monitors. Let's not pretend that SJ's thread is unique here.
More importantly, we've discussed several different distinctions as to why FII is quite different from what came after. Obviously the switch from DS to JR was a fundamental change in DT's sound. There are several others that are similarly important. I think these are pretty interesting things to discuss; hence my uncommon participation in a DT thread.
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First off, most of the threads in the DT side are merely excuses to splooge DT related Smiles all over people's monitors. Let's not pretend that SJ's thread is unique here.
More importantly, we've discussed several different distinctions as to why FII is quite different from what came after. Obviously the switch from DS to JR was a fundamental change in DT's sound. There are several others that are similarly important. I think these are pretty interesting things to discuss; hence my uncommon participation in a DT thread.
And it's extremely welcome participation, that's for sure.
FII is very different. Like you said, the switch from DS to JR was the obvious shift, but one can't help but notice just how much JP's guitar work also shifted from FII onward. FII is not my favorite DT record by a long shot, but it does contain jazzy, bluesy, fusion elements in JP's guitar playing that he has touched on since, but not nearly to the degree that he did on this record.
Kinda begs the question as to whether the change in keys player affected JP's stylistic shift (albeit slight) or if he was heading that way no matter what and JR simply reinforced it.
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FII is very different. Like you said, the switch from DS to JR was the obvious shift, but one can't help but notice just how much JP's guitar work also shifted from FII onward. FII is not my favorite DT record by a long shot, but it does contain jazzy, bluesy, fusion elements in JP's guitar playing that he has touched on since, but not nearly to the degree that he did on this record.
Kinda begs the question as to whether the change in keys player affected JP's stylistic shift (albeit slight) or if he was heading that way no matter what and JR simply reinforced it.
The guitar work observation is spot-on, and is one of the reasons I love FII. I think JP played with a lot more touch and feel back then. It was obvious to me that he was expanding his boundaries a bit, and looking for a way to marry his style with what both the record company wanted for crossover appeal, Derek's more blues-based playing, and his own diverse musical interests.
As we all know, after the FII era, a lot of that jazzy, bluesy, fusion stuff went away for a more standard progressive metal sound. In combination with JR's style, DT just evolved a different way.
For me personally, I was really disappointed, and don't like DT nearly as much as I did in the FII days. But still a great band.
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FII is very different. Like you said, the switch from DS to JR was the obvious shift, but one can't help but notice just how much JP's guitar work also shifted from FII onward. FII is not my favorite DT record by a long shot, but it does contain jazzy, bluesy, fusion elements in JP's guitar playing that he has touched on since, but not nearly to the degree that he did on this record.
Kinda begs the question as to whether the change in keys player affected JP's stylistic shift (albeit slight) or if he was heading that way no matter what and JR simply reinforced it.
The guitar work observation is spot-on, and is one of the reasons I love FII. I think JP played with a lot more touch and feel back then. It was obvious to me that he was expanding his boundaries a bit, and looking for a way to marry his style with what both the record company wanted for crossover appeal, Derek's more blues-based playing, and his own diverse musical interests.
As we all know, after the FII era, a lot of that jazzy, bluesy, fusion stuff went away for a more standard progressive metal sound. In combination with JR's style, DT just evolved a different way.
For me personally, I was really disappointed, and don't like DT nearly as much as I did in the FII days. But still a great band.
Yes, you’ve seized on it! What makes FII the last truly great DT album is that experimentation with different styles and crossover of styles. On Awake too, they really tried to capture the grunge sound and sort of make it their own. The Beatles did this too, first with rockability and rock ‘n’ roll, then with folk rock, then psychedelia, and finally Zeppelin-esque blues rock. Since then, that sort of diversity has basically flatlined in favor of generic prog metal.
See I did have a point...I just couldn’t properly articulate it. ;D
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FII is very different. Like you said, the switch from DS to JR was the obvious shift, but one can't help but notice just how much JP's guitar work also shifted from FII onward. FII is not my favorite DT record by a long shot, but it does contain jazzy, bluesy, fusion elements in JP's guitar playing that he has touched on since, but not nearly to the degree that he did on this record.
Kinda begs the question as to whether the change in keys player affected JP's stylistic shift (albeit slight) or if he was heading that way no matter what and JR simply reinforced it.
The guitar work observation is spot-on, and is one of the reasons I love FII. I think JP played with a lot more touch and feel back then. It was obvious to me that he was expanding his boundaries a bit, and looking for a way to marry his style with what both the record company wanted for crossover appeal, Derek's more blues-based playing, and his own diverse musical interests.
As we all know, after the FII era, a lot of that jazzy, bluesy, fusion stuff went away for a more standard progressive metal sound. In combination with JR's style, DT just evolved a different way.
For me personally, I was really disappointed, and don't like DT nearly as much as I did in the FII days. But still a great band.
Yes, you’ve seized on it! What makes FII the last truly great DT album is that experimentation with different styles and crossover of styles. On Awake too, they really tried to capture the grunge sound and sort of make it their own. The Beatles did this too, first with rockability and rock ‘n’ roll, then with folk rock, then psychedelia, and finally Zeppelin-esque blues rock. Since then, that sort of diversity has basically flatlined in favor of generic prog metal.
See I did have a point...I just couldn’t properly articulate it. ;D
But isn't that the genere/sound they created? We call it generic now because A LOT of bands have copied it, but that doesn't mean it's not original coming from them, it's the signature DT sound.
Also, all the jazzy/bluesy elements weren't present on the first three albums, so it's not like after FII they suddenly decided to completely shift the sound they had built before. FII was the big change in their sound, and not the other way around. SFAM has much more in common with IAW, stylistically, than with FII, and SDOIT was just the natural progression from Scenes.
I do agree on the thought that they got stuck in a similar mindset/sound from TOT to Black Clouds, but an album like TA, for example, is anything but "generic prog metal".
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I like Falling into Infinity, a lot. I just like it less than a good portion of their other albums, some of which came before and some which came after. I wouldn't call any of their albums generic though. There are those who don't like any of the albums from Train of Thought to Black Clouds, but I think more who like album X but not album Y, etc. Those 4 albums are quite different from each other.
As to JP's guitar playing - I love his playing on old and new DT. I lot of my favorite stuff has happened since FII. If it's not bluesy enough for some that's cool. But I think "feel" is a huge part of his playing and the emotion that goes into it is a large part of what sets him apart. If someone listens to him and all they get is "too fast and technical" so be it, but to my ears there's a lot more to it than that.
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FII is very different. Like you said, the switch from DS to JR was the obvious shift, but one can't help but notice just how much JP's guitar work also shifted from FII onward. FII is not my favorite DT record by a long shot, but it does contain jazzy, bluesy, fusion elements in JP's guitar playing that he has touched on since, but not nearly to the degree that he did on this record.
Kinda begs the question as to whether the change in keys player affected JP's stylistic shift (albeit slight) or if he was heading that way no matter what and JR simply reinforced it.
The guitar work observation is spot-on, and is one of the reasons I love FII. I think JP played with a lot more touch and feel back then. It was obvious to me that he was expanding his boundaries a bit, and looking for a way to marry his style with what both the record company wanted for crossover appeal, Derek's more blues-based playing, and his own diverse musical interests.
As we all know, after the FII era, a lot of that jazzy, bluesy, fusion stuff went away for a more standard progressive metal sound. In combination with JR's style, DT just evolved a different way.
For me personally, I was really disappointed, and don't like DT nearly as much as I did in the FII days. But still a great band.
Yes, you’ve seized on it! What makes FII the last truly great DT album is that experimentation with different styles and crossover of styles. On Awake too, they really tried to capture the grunge sound and sort of make it their own. The Beatles did this too, first with rockability and rock ‘n’ roll, then with folk rock, then psychedelia, and finally Zeppelin-esque blues rock. Since then, that sort of diversity has basically flatlined in favor of generic prog metal.
See I did have a point...I just couldn’t properly articulate it. ;D
But isn't that the genere/sound they created? We call it generic now because A LOT of bands have copied it, but that doesn't mean it's not original coming from them, it's the signature DT sound.
Also, all the jazzy/bluesy elements weren't present on the first three albums, so it's not like after FII they suddenly decided to completely shift the sound they had built before. FII was the big change in their sound, and not the other way around. SFAM has much more in common with IAW, stylistically, than with FII, and SDOIT was just the natural progression from Scenes.
I do agree on the thought that they got stuck in a similar mindset/sound from TOT to Black Clouds, but an album like TA, for example, is anything but "generic prog metal".
If you think DT created that sound you must not have heard of Queensryche or Fatez Warning (just kidding).
And while there were no bluesy elements before, like I said, that sort of experimentation was present on Awake as well. It’s somewhat disingenuous to assert that it wasn’t happening in other ways just because it wasn’t happening in literally the same way before.
Furthermore, what this and Awake represented for DT was them thinking outside the box, which they definitely don’t do anymore. The last five or six albums have been the same thing in different packaging. Not exactly thinking outside the box.
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The last five or six albums have been the same thing in different packaging. Not exactly thinking outside the box.
I get it that you don't connect with DT the way you used to and that you prefer the stuff they were doing 20 years ago but this could not be further from the truth. Like it or not, "The Astonishing" isn't the same thing they've been doing in the last couple of years with different packaging. And there are sufficient stylistic differences between all the other albums that came before it to render your statement untrue.
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The last five or six albums have been the same thing in different packaging. Not exactly thinking outside the box.
I get it that you don't connect with DT the way you used to and that you prefer the stuff they were doing 20 years ago but this could not be further from the truth. Like it or not, "The Astonishing" isn't the same thing they've been doing in the last couple of years with different packaging. And there are sufficient stylistic differences between all the other albums that came before it to render your statement untrue.
Agreed. While I certainly do appreciate the ambition of TA, and I do like some parts of the album, I would probably rank it as my least favorite album of there's. BUT, that doesn't mean that I would say that it continues as "the same thing in different packaging" - far from it.
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I think Scenes is pretty incredible. After that if fluctuates between good and bad, but it never quite got back to really extraordinary imo. (even though I LOVE TOT)
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I never owned this album until this past weekend. I always wrote it off since so many people claimed that it was DT's worst record. Over the years, I've enjoyed the live songs on Once in Livetime, and Burning My Soul (obviously... :metal), so I figured I should check the studio album out.
To me, it's where the line is drawn between the band's more "organic" sound (I've used this to describe Queensryche's Q2K record too - it's just a feeling I get when I hear the album and it seems like there was just a general consensus to write songs and let the music flow) and the more "manufactured" or "constructed" sound of Dream Theater afterwards. And that's not a bad thing - I love some of the DT albums that followed, but it really is evident that this album is the dividing line between the two eras.
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What does Reddit have to do with this forum? Disclaimer, I don't know anything about Reddit.
Hmm... I would say ADToE is great, there is a noticeable drop-off with DT12, and I like TA quite a bit, but can't quite put it in the "great" category.
I apologize for being snarky. You came out with a strong opinion and I came back with mine unnecessarily strong.
Oh, Reddit is kind of like a huge forum so I focused most of my social media energy there. Anyway, no worries - this is DTF, we know drama.
Definitely agree that DT12 was a huge drop-off. It’s because of that album that I no longer consider myself a fan per se.
That's kinda lame.
I hated TA but still love this band.
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I never owned this album until this past weekend. I always wrote it off since so many people claimed that it was DT's worst record. Over the years, I've enjoyed the live songs on Once in Livetime, and Burning My Soul (obviously... :metal), so I figured I should check the studio album out.
To me, it's where the line is drawn between the band's more "organic" sound (I've used this to describe Queensryche's Q2K record too - it's just a feeling I get when I hear the album and it seems like there was just a general consensus to write songs and let the music flow) and the more "manufactured" or "constructed" sound of Dream Theater afterwards. And that's not a bad thing - I love some of the DT albums that followed, but it really is evident that this album is the dividing line between the two eras.
Still one of my favorite Dream Theater records. Absolutely more organic. I think the fact the band had to write so many songs for it to finally get the green light to record, really brought out something great in the band.
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Since we're talking about this, why do you guys think the band never bothered to properly record and release those B sides since a good portion of the fan base seems to like them? I think the greatest hit album would have been a great opportunity to do it.
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I think the fact the band had to write so many songs for it to finally get the green light to record, really brought out something great in the band.
Never thought of it that way (and I highly disagree with the outcome). Interesting.
Since we're talking about this, why do you guys think the band never bothered to properly record and release those B sides since a good portion of the fan base seems to like them?
Because they aren't very good songs.
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Since we're talking about this, why do you guys think the band never bothered to properly record and release those B sides since a good portion of the fan base seems to like them? I think the greatest hit album would have been a great opportunity to do it.
My guess is frustration with the process. By the time they finally got the green light, and knew what songs were going to be fully recorded, they probably just wanted to crank it out and move on, relieved to get done and onward. If that was the case, I can't really blame them, despite myself loving the leftover songs, in some cases more than some of the album tracks.
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Honestly, I just don't think they deemed it "necessary." There was no reason to during the FII cycle, not to mention the fact that the studio didn't green light additional time to properly record those extra songs. But the band did ultimately get them to the fans in several formats, with the Cleaning Out the Closet fan club disk, some of the songs being played live in several versions, and then much later by releasing the FII demos on Ytsejam. I just don't think they have ever felt like there was a need to go back into the studio after the fact to re-record updated versions of those songs. And I mostly agree with that. We have them already. Getting slightly more polished versions wouldn't be worth the time and effort on the band's part.
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Good point, they had been in the studio and off the road for a while by that point, yes? Certainly they would want to get that album out and tour.
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Since we're talking about this, why do you guys think the band never bothered to properly record and release those B sides since a good portion of the fan base seems to like them? I think the greatest hit album would have been a great opportunity to do it.
My guess is frustration with the process. By the time they finally got the green light, and knew what songs were going to be fully recorded, they probably just wanted to crank it out and move on, relieved to get done and onward. If that was the case, I can't really blame them, despite myself loving the leftover songs, in some cases more than some of the album tracks.
I can get the frustration at the time, but I'm talking years later. The material is there, just not in a good quality.
Since we're talking about this, why do you guys think the band never bothered to properly record and release those B sides since a good portion of the fan base seems to like them?
Because they aren't very good songs.
Now you're just being silly :smiley:
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Honestly, I just don't think they deemed it "necessary." There was no reason to during the FII cycle, not to mention the fact that the studio didn't green light additional time to properly record those extra songs. But the band did ultimately get them to the fans in several formats, with the Cleaning Out the Closet fan club disk, some of the songs being played live in several versions, and then much later by releasing the FII demos on Ytsejam. I just don't think they have ever felt like there was a need to go back into the studio after the fact to re-record updated versions of those songs. And I mostly agree with that. We have them already. Getting slightly more polished versions wouldn't be worth the time and effort on the band's part.
Ok, I can accept they might not think it worth their time. I think it would be nice to have a good clean version of those since the demo and live versions sound worse than WDADU :P
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Honestly, I just don't think they deemed it "necessary." There was no reason to during the FII cycle, not to mention the fact that the studio didn't green light additional time to properly record those extra songs. But the band did ultimately get them to the fans in several formats, with the Cleaning Out the Closet fan club disk, some of the songs being played live in several versions, and then much later by releasing the FII demos on Ytsejam. I just don't think they have ever felt like there was a need to go back into the studio after the fact to re-record updated versions of those songs. And I mostly agree with that. We have them already. Getting slightly more polished versions wouldn't be worth the time and effort on the band's part.
Ok, I can accept they might not think it worth their time. I think it would be nice to have a good clean version of those since the demo and live versions sound worse than WDADU :P
All I can say is:
Now you're just being silly :smiley:
I mean, Mission from 'Arry is a really cool extra that Maiden released for the fans. After it gained some popularity and traction, was there ever any REAL demand for a better quality re-recording of it? Not too much different, right?
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Not being a big Maiden fan I don't really know what you're talking about.
If the guys don't think it's worth the effort it's OK, it's just something that came to my mind and thought it would have been nice of them to include 1 or 2 of those songs when they released their greatest hit album since that seemed like the ideal time to do it.
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Not being a big Maiden fan...
Now you're just being silly :smiley:
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Correct me if I am wrong on this, but in the originally envisioned 2 CD Falling into Infinity, all those songs we consider b-sides and extras now (Cover My Eyes, Speak to Me, etc.) would have been on the final product, along with Metropolis Pt. 2, right? At least theoretically?
I don't think the band necessarily considered them b-sides. I think they truly wanted to record them. But as bosk said, once they got green-lit, and they knew it would be a single disc, they just recorded what was going to be on the record and moved forward.
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Correct me if I am wrong on this, but in the originally envisioned 2 CD Falling into Infinity, all those songs we consider b-sides and extras now (Cover My Eyes, Speak to Me, etc.) would have been on the final product, along with Metropolis Pt. 2, right? At least theoretically?
I don't think the band necessarily considered them b-sides. I think they truly wanted to record them. But as bosk said, once they got green-lit, and they knew it would be a single disc, they just recorded what was going to be on the record and moved forward.
Yes, but the songs that ended up being recorded were re arranged and changed by Kevin Shirley (some more than others), so the other songs would've been different from what we know if they ended up recording them anyway.
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We've got Raise the Knife from Score and Speak to Me and Cover My Eyes from the Livetime video. Everything else is fine enough as it is on the Ytejam release :hat
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Since we're talking about this, why do you guys think the band never bothered to properly record and release those B sides since a good portion of the fan base seems to like them? I think the greatest hit album would have been a great opportunity to do it.
I'm sure it's one or more of the following:
1. I'm not sure what evidence there is that "a good portion of the fan base seems to like them." A few dozen folks on a message board does not equate to "a good portion of the fan base."
2. Those fans who have expressed interest in the songs are, in general, completists and are expressing interest in the songs for that reason and not because they think the songs are particularly good.
3. The songs in general weren't good enough to make the album or warrant consideration as b-sides. That alone is reason enough to ignore them.
4. As time has gone by, any interest among the band members in revisiting rejected songs likely diminishes -- especially since 40% of the current band wasn't around when those songs were written and/or demoed.
5. Most of the songs exist in some form of official or semi-official release other than the fan club CD (which, while not having been widely distributed, is now readily available to anyone who wants to listen). TLF is on the Ytse Jam demo CD and the greatest hits package (how much more "proper" can you get?). Eve was the b-side to the Silent Man single (and, since it was entirely a Kevin Moore thing, it obviously wasn't and isn't going to get any attention after he left the band). RtK was done live on Score. CME was on Once in a Livetime. StM is on the Japanese version of FII.
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If the guys don't think it's worth the effort it's OK, it's just something that came to my mind and thought it would have been nice of them to include 1 or 2 of those songs when they released their greatest hit album since that seemed like the ideal time to do it.
Perhaps you should give the track list of Greatest Hit another look.
Since we're talking about this, why do you guys think the band never bothered to properly record and release those B sides since a good portion of the fan base seems to like them?
Because they aren't very good songs.
Now you're just being silly :smiley:
Why is that "silly"?
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Since we're talking about this, why do you guys think the band never bothered to properly record and release those B sides since a good portion of the fan base seems to like them?
Because they aren't very good songs.
Now you're just being silly :smiley:
Why is that "silly"?
Innocent remark on how people have different opinions and tastes
Not being a big Maiden fan...
Now you're just being silly :smiley:
Hey, I didn't say I'm not a Maiden fan, I just not a BIG fan ;)
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As an aside, does anyone know if the track sequence on the FII Demos set released on Ytsejam was indeed the "official" order the band (or at least MP) envisioned for the record, if they had been able to do a double-album?
I always assumed it was, given that MP did the FII demos set, but I never saw anything definitive.
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I don't think they ever came to a point where they said "Cool, we're making a double album, it will come out like this", they probably were artistically blocked way before.
Also, wasn't the tracklist just the order in which the songs were written?
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I don't think they ever came to a point where they said "Cool, we're making a double album, it will come out like this", they probably were artistically blocked way before.
Also, wasn't the tracklist just the order in which the songs were written?
I don't know. That's why I am asking someone who actually knows, or remembers hearing something about it, to comment. :)
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Also, wasn't the tracklist just the order in which the songs were written?
That's what I remember reading.
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Also, wasn't the tracklist just the order in which the songs were written?
I don't think so. I know MP thought Raise The Knife would be a good opener. Where Are You Now? He said was the first song written, being they didn't know where they wanted to go with the album. I'll look it up
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Also, wasn't the tracklist just the order in which the songs were written?
I don't think so. I know MP thought Raise The Knife would be a good opener. Where Are You Now? He said was the first song written, being they didn't know where they wanted to go with the album. I'll look it up
According to MP, Raise The Knife was originally written for ACOS, so yes, it was the first song written out of the bunch, even though WAYN is the first song written specifically for the album.
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Nope, The Astonishing was the last truly great Dream Theater album! :tup
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Octavarium was the last truly great DT album, as in it's the last album where there were no skippable tracks. That includes Never Enough which I used to hate, but isn't an atrocity like Prophets of War.
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I wanna say SFAM was their last great one, 6DOIT was good but then it was all downhill. ADTOE was alright.
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I think SDOIT was that last truly great DT album. Hope no one feels belittled if they disagree. Well, actually I really don't care. :rollin
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:lol Well, I think that, whether one agrees or disagrees, that is SIGNIFICANTLY less controversial than the thread title, which ignores the fact that I think MOST of the fan base would consider SFAM and/or SDOIT "truly great." I happen to disagree with you, but I can respect your opinion. My respect for the original poster as a person aside, I can't really respect the opinion expressed in the original post.
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I agree with SFAM being truly great as well as most of the others that came before SDOIT. Just not after. Some of them definitely good, but not great. Oh well, I think SDOIT is their greatest overall achievement and set the bar really high. It was a tough act to follow.
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My respect for the original poster as a person aside, I can't really respect the opinion expressed in the original post.
I can't respect that opinion either, because: (1) the OP never even tried to articulate what it means for an album to be "truly great;" (2) the OP never articulated why no subsequent album was "truly great;" and (3) some of the reasons offered in the original post for the "true greatness" of FII were objectively silly (e.g., the Chapman Stick was used on a couple albums, and DS played on the album). Ultimately, all the OP was saying was that he subjectively prefers FII to anything that came after it.
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My respect for the original poster as a person aside, I can't really respect the opinion expressed in the original post.
I can't respect that opinion either, because: (1) the OP never even tried to articulate what it means for an album to be "truly great;" (2) the OP never articulated why no subsequent album was "truly great;" and (3) some of the reasons offered in the original post for the "true greatness" of FII were objectively silly (e.g., the Chapman Stick was used on a couple albums, and DS played on the album). Ultimately, all the OP was saying was that he subjectively prefers FII to anything that came after it.
So you can't respect an opinion because it doesn't meet your criteria? It's an opinion. While I disagree with the OP's opinion, the OP doesn't have to articulate on their opinions if they don't want to. According to number 3 in your post, you say the OP's reasons were objectively silly. Maybe to you, but not to the OP.
We're on the 5th page of a thread analyzing and ridiculing someone's opinion but at the same time attempting to justify our own.
Let someone have an opinion. They have a right to be wrong. ;)
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At least for the OP, Dream Theater had an album that connected with him. DT has so much variety in their music, it can be hit and miss with many people.
I have an older brother that doesn't like most of their stuff, but he sais illumination Theory is one of his favorite songs of all time from any band. For some reason that particular song made a connection with him.
Why he doesn't "get" alot of DT's other music, still leaves me scratching my head. lol. ???
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Why somebody would consider IT one of their favorites from any band is a head scratcher in itself.
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Ha! IT is a fantastic song, but I see what your saying. My brother seems to have a.d.d. and I'm actually shocked he ever even made it through illumination Theory. I guess he listened to it through headphones while skiing. I doubt he'll ever have another euphoric moment like that, and won't take the time to check out DT's catalog..lol!
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My respect for the original poster as a person aside, I can't really respect the opinion expressed in the original post.
I can't respect that opinion either, because: (1) the OP never even tried to articulate what it means for an album to be "truly great;" (2) the OP never articulated why no subsequent album was "truly great;" and (3) some of the reasons offered in the original post for the "true greatness" of FII were objectively silly (e.g., the Chapman Stick was used on a couple albums, and DS played on the album). Ultimately, all the OP was saying was that he subjectively prefers FII to anything that came after it.
So you can't respect an opinion because it doesn't meet your criteria? It's an opinion. While I disagree with the OP's opinion, the OP doesn't have to articulate on their opinions if they don't want to. According to number 3 in your post, you say the OP's reasons were objectively silly. Maybe to you, but not to the OP.
We're on the 5th page of a thread analyzing and ridiculing someone's opinion but at the same time attempting to justify our own.
Let someone have an opinion. They have a right to be wrong. ;)
Yes, I can't respect an opinion that lacks meaning and is offered without any clear factual basis. I agree with you that "the OP doesn't have to articulate on their [sic] opinions." However, that doesn't preclude me or anyone else from taking issue with the opinion. Opinions cannot be "right" or "wrong," but they can be baseless.
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Why somebody would consider IT one of their favorites from any band is a head scratcher in itself.
Well, it is a great song. What's strange is that out of all DT's catalogue that's the one he likes the most considering it's a 20+ minute epic with a break and a soft instrumental that would throw off most people, even if they got that far.
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All the times I've heard IT (which isn't very many), "great song" never even occurred to me. Parts of it sound too much like Rush (which shouldn't be a bad thing, but in this case it was) and most of the other parts are trying to recapture the glory of SDOIT. It just doesn't work for me.
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IT is the best song from the Mangini era so far :metal
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IT is my favourite song off FII