DT Songs Longer Than 10 Minutes VS Shorter Than 10 Minutes

[The Letter M]

So as prog fans, sometimes we get excited when we see that a song's track length is breaking double-digits in the minutes-side of the clock, be it 10-15 or 20-25 minutes long, and in the latter half of DT's career, they've made a LOT of songs that are fairly long.

But, if you had to choose one set versus the other, which would you pick? Here's a breakdown of the songs for your convenience:

Dream Theater Songs Shorter Than 10 Minutes:
All of The Majesty Demos except "A Vision"
All of When Dream And Day Unite
"Don't Look Past Me" & "To Live Forever
All of Images And Words except "Learning To Live"
"Eve"
All of Awake except "Scarred"
"Where Are You Now?", "The Way It used To Be", "Cover My Eyes", and "Speak To Me"
All of Falling Into Infinity except "Lines In The Sand" & "Trial Of Tears"
All of Scenes From A Memory except "Beyond This Life", "Home" and "Finally Free"
"Misunderstood" & "Disappear"
"As I Am" & "Vacant"
All of Octavarium except "Sacrificed Sons" & "Octavarium"
"Forsaken", "Constant Motion", "The Dark Eternal Night", and "Prophets Of War"
"A Rite Of Passage"  & "Wither"
"On The Backs Of Angels", "Build Me Up, Break Me Down",  "This Is The Life" , "Far From Heaven",  and "Beneath The Surface"
All of Dream Theater except "Illumination Theory"

Dream Theater Songs Longer Than 10 Minutes:
"A Vision"
"Learning To Live"
"Scarred"
"A Change Of Seasons"
"Raise The Knife"
"Lines In The Sand" & "Trial Of Tears"
"Beyond This Life", "Home" and "Finally Free"
All of Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence except "Misunderstood" & "Disappear"
All of Train Of Thought except "As I Am" & "Vacant"
"Sacrificed Sons" & "Octavarium"
"In The Presence Of Enemies", "Reprentance" and "The Ministry Of Lost Souls"
"A Nightmare To Remember", "The Shattered Fortress", "The Best Of Times", and "The Count Of Tuscany"
"Lost Not Forgotten", "Bridges In The Sky", "Outcry", and "Breaking All Illusions"
"Illumination Theory"

The longer side has 33 songs total (counting multi-track epics ITPOE and SDOIT as one song), while the shorter side has a whooping 86 songs. Not included in this count, as studio demos go, are "Resurrection of Ernie", "The School Song" and "Cry For Freedom" as they never really got finished beyond the demo stage (unlike the tracks featured on Cleaning Out The Closet or The Majesty Demos).

I'm not sure how LONG the Longer-Than-10-Minutes side amounts to, as far as playlist time (approximately 475 minutes, I think), so if someone wants to figure that (and the shorter side) out, that'd be nice!

Anyways, I know this is a silly and arbitrary poll, but I figured I'd do something quite different than the usual, so let's see what everyone has to say. Do you like your DT songs long? Or short?

-Marc.

[Jaffa]

I think I'm going to have to abstain from voting on this one, on the grounds of what the fuck. 

[TheGreatPretender]

I had to go with shorter than 10 minutes. While I really love their 10+ minute songs, the shorter songs do include gems like Forsaken, Surrender to Reason, Hollow Years, As I Am, The Root of All Evil, Raise The Knife, the best of SFAM and of course, Metropolis Pt. 1. Just too many amazing gems to pass up.

[The Letter M]

Raise The Knife

Check again - "Raise The Knife" is definitely longer than ten minutes.

- Marc.

[TheGreatPretender]

Raise The Knife

Check again - "Raise The Knife" is definitely longer than ten minutes.

- Marc.

Huh, you're right. Well, a worthy loss. Replace it with ITPOE Pt. 1 then. Even better!

[bl5150]

Images and Words is my favourite album by the length of the straight and you could count the number of 10min+ songs that I would really,truly miss on one hand (BAI, IT, LTL SDOIT,TOT) , so pretty easy really...............<10min.

[krands85]

Images and Words is my favourite album too. However, there are only 2 songs less than 10 minutes long in my top 15 DT tracks, so I think you can guess which option I went for 

[TheGreatPretender]

Images and Words is my favourite album by the length of the straight and you could count the number of 10min+ songs that I would really,truly miss on one hand (BAI, IT, LTL SDOIT,TOT) , so pretty easy really...............<10min.

Unless you cound SDOIT by the separate tracks. Then you don't have to miss out at all.

[hefdaddy42]

Since it is arbitrary and doesn't really matter, I went with the ones longer than 10 minutes.

[TheCountOfNYC]

My top 10 has Octavarium (number 1), The Count of Tuscany (number 2), A Change of Seasons (number 3), Breaking All Illusions (number 4), Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence (number 6), and Bridges in the Sky (number 10). Honestly most of my favorite songs by any band are among their longest. I love long songs because of the adventure they take you on. You can only fit so many twists and turns into a shorter song. With the long ones, you never know where the song is going to end up and I love taking that journey.

[TheGreatPretender]

You can only fit so many twists and turns into a shorter song.

Tell that to The Dance Of Eternity. 

[JiM-Xtreme]

Longer songs. I like it best when they don't try to constrain themselves so much 

[RoeDent]

Because I have too much time on my hands, I've just worked out the total time of DT's 10-minute-plus songs (as listed above) is 8 hours, 3 minutes and 27 seconds, or 483:27.

Most of these songs are 11 minutes (10), with three of those (A Vision, Endless Sacrifice and Outcry) clocking in at exactly 11:24.

[TheCountOfNYC]

You can only fit so many twists and turns into a shorter song.

Tell that to The Dance Of Eternity. 

Well that's the exception.

[adamack]

Cool thread topic!

I had to go with the Greater Than 10 Minute option.

Mainly for these:

Bridges In The Sky, Outcry, and Breaking All Illusions
Beyond This Life, Home and Finally Free
The Great Debate
Sacrificed Sons & Octavarium
A Change Of Seasons
Lines In The Sand
SDOIT
Endless Sacrifice, In The Name Of God and Honor Thy Father
Reprentance and The Ministry Of Lost Souls
The Count Of Tuscany

[wolfking]

I honestly can't decide.

[TheGreatPretender]

I honestly can't decide.

Well, you have to! Otherwise you can't listen to any Dream Theater ever again.

[CharlesPL]

I honestly can't decide.

This

[JediKnight1969]

To pick one?

[RoeDent]

Longer than 10 minutes. Four of my top 5 are 10+, and the other one is close enough (Metropolis, 9:32).

[Nekov]

To pick one?

Agreed. While I like most of the "more than 10 minutes" songs there are way too many I like from the shorter list as well.

[Dublagent66]

I dunno.  I like a lot of songs in both categories.  Doesn't really make much sense picking one or the other.  Good info though.  Would be fun to participate in a survivor of each choice.

[wolfking]

I honestly can't decide.

Well, you have to! Otherwise you can't listen to any Dream Theater ever again.

Really?  That sucks.

I pick shorter.  Just cause there's way more songs and therefore more variety.

[ThatOneGuy2112]

Gun to my head, I'd probably say the longer songs. Mostly cause I don't wanna get shot.

Other than that, I can't decide.

[Nearmyth]

I think my whole Top 10 is songs longer than 10 minutes... sooo