Author Topic: Arjen Lucassen Discography Thread v. A moment lost in time  (Read 27098 times)

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Offline cramx3

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Following.

I havent really listened to any of his stuff besides The Gentle Storm which I loved so I purchased the new Blu-Ray since I love watching concerts, but haven't had time to watch it yet.

Offline Evermind

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To all people who are following, you're welcome, guys! Glad to have you all on board.

And I love the version with the semi-acoustic bonus disc. Not sure if that will be covered later on in this thread. I really like the renditions of Merlin's Will and Sail Away to Avalon in particular, which unlike many acoustic versions of metal songs, retain some of their metal prowress. Actually, I think I prefer the semi-acoustic disc as a whole.

I actually intended to write something about it and I had that wall of text about the album itself, so I decided to exclude the paragraphs I wrote about it. These paragraphs didn't even make the first draft. I think I can do it when we get to the year that edition was released, which is 2005 I think.

Following.

I havent really listened to any of his stuff besides The Gentle Storm which I loved so I purchased the new Blu-Ray since I love watching concerts, but haven't had time to watch it yet.

The Theater Equation? This isn't your usual concert at all, but it's great nonetheless.



So guys, how about September 21st, Wednesday, 7 P.M. GMT for The Final Experiment listening session? I know Train will be able to join, and probably Scorp too, judging by his post earlier in this thread. Anyone else?

If you missed what it's about, here's the post by Train explaining the whole thing:

The idea is that Ruslan would have the album play through his TeamSpeak and the rest of the guys in the chat could comment along the way (most likely by typing since speaking could kinda ruin the album experiencce). Obviously with all the different timezones it's not going to be easy to please everyone. Right now we're thinking the best option we have is to do it around this time of the day, which means the Europeans would probably be home from work/school, for the rest of you it would be a bit harder to adapt, but maybe some have a day off or work evening/nightjobs or whatever.
« Last Edit: September 19, 2016, 11:08:27 AM by Evermind »
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Offline cramx3

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Following.

I havent really listened to any of his stuff besides The Gentle Storm which I loved so I purchased the new Blu-Ray since I love watching concerts, but haven't had time to watch it yet.

The Theater Equation? This isn't your usual concert at all, but it's great nonetheless.

Yup, I understand that.  Part of why I went for that instead of just buying an album. 

Offline Mosh

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I might actually be able to participate in the teamspeak thing. I have to be somewhere later but I should have time for the album.
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Offline Evermind

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I might actually be able to participate in the teamspeak thing. I have to be somewhere later but I should have time for the album.

Sounds great!

I'll write the tutorial of how to download and use Teamspeak to join the listening session, in case anyone needs it. I'll probably post it tomorrow together with guidelines of how the session is going to happen.
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Offline Tomislav95

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It's 9 PM my time so I'll probably join if I'm home.
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Offline Scorpion

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Yeah, I'm in for this. That's 8 P.M., my time, so that should work pretty well.
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Offline Tomislav95

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Anyone else think first half of The Banishment sounds like something off The Who's Quadrophenia, especially vocal melodies?
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Offline Evermind

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Anyone else think first half of The Banishment sounds like something off The Who's Quadrophenia, especially vocal melodies?

It kind of does now that you say it, but I didn't catch it before I saw your post.

We've tested the sound with Train right now, and it's absolutely not as perfect as he said earlier. The listening is still scheduled for tomorrow evening, but there are some tests to be made (or otherwise you'll be listening to the album in like 128 kbps or something). I'm testing the things now so the tutorial might wait for tomorrow. We'll see how it goes.

Tomislav, if you're reading this, check your PMs.

Okay, scratch this, I've got this. Much better quality now. The tutorial is coming up in an hour.
« Last Edit: September 20, 2016, 01:02:18 PM by Evermind »
This first band is Soen very cool swingy jazz fusion kinda stuff.

Offline Evermind

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The Final Experiment listening session - Wednesday, September 21st, 7 P.M. GMT!

Since some of you guys asked for these listening sessions, we decided to deliver! I'm honestly not sure how this will go over, but you never know until you try, so here we go.

The listening session will take place in Teamspeak 3. I can't provide you the absolutely clear CD-quality sound since there is compression on the Teamspeak channels (and server with a proper codec for streaming music costs money, I guess; while our server was never intended for that), but I think I've found a combination of settings that will allow you guys to hear the music in decent quality. And if you like what you're hearing, you should  support the artist and buy the album.

For those who aren't familiar with Teamspeak 3, here's what you should do:

1. Get the latest Teamspeak 3.0.19.4 version from here. Pick the link you need depending on your OS.

2. Install the client. Follow the instructions inside the installing manager.

3. Launch the client. Connect to the server via Connections -> Connect. Put the following address and your own nickname into the respective fields:



(here's the address for you to copy)
ts3server://ts1.voice-server.ru?port=10370&password=01011

This link contains the one-time password which will work for the next 36 hours. This should allow you to enter our Teamspeak 3 Server. You will be automatically placed in Default Channel. From here, you can also access Open Channel 1 and Open Channel 2 if you need to.



Default and Open Channels are the only ones you can enter, the other ones require passwords to enter. The actual listening will be happening in "Arjen Lucassen Listening Sessions" channel (duh). I will drag everyone from Default / Open Channels in there. In case someone will join in just to troll us (which I doubt, but it never hurts to be careful), I will be able to kick the person from that channel and they won't be able to join back.

4. When you're in Teamspeak and in the right channel (or not), be sure to check some of your settings:

- "Settings" -> "Playback" -> Playback Device should be showing your preferred playback device, like speakers or headphones or whatever.

- "Settings" -> "Capture" -> Capture Device should be showing your microphone if you want to talk with people before and after the listening. Be sure to either use "Push to Talk" option which requires you to push the button of your choice to be able to talk, or "Voice Activation Detection" which will automatically react at any noise you made and put your mic on depending on the level of noise.

- Note that you won't be able to talk during the listening itself. We will be able to voice-chat before and after the listening, but to avoid the interruptions, every interaction during the listening should take place in the text-chat. You should mute your microphone for that time just in case.

- I recommend to disable any voice notifications (like the ones that alert you when anyone joins your channel) via "Settings" -> "Notifications" -> pick Sounds Deactivated option.

5. Please note that since it's an extention of the project I'm doing on DTF, most of the rules used on DTF apply. If you're going to criticize the band, try to do it politely, or you'll break my tender heart or something. I mean, just don't go all "hell, this sucks" on me. I won't appreciate that.

6. Despite the session beginning at 7 P.M., I will be in Teamspeak from 6 P.M. onwards. If you want to test your equipment and anything else, I'll be there and I'll be glad to help you.

7. Bring some drinks or whatever. Keep in mind there will be no pauses in listening for full 70 minutes, so you might want to plan for that in advance.

8. Discuss things in chat and have fun!

(Surely I forgot something but it's already 11 P.M. here and it's getting more difficult to write this with each passing second, so that's it for now.)
This first band is Soen very cool swingy jazz fusion kinda stuff.

Offline Train of Naught

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Just remembered that back when we were on teamspeak the other day, even if I didn't hold the press-to-talk key, while you couldn't hear me speak, you were still able to hear my keyboard.

That might be an issue when we're doing a full 70 minute listen because surely I'm going to be typing at some point. Guess we'll figure this out tomorrow before the listening session though.
people on this board are actual music fans who developed taste in music and not casual listeners who are following current fashion trends and listening to only current commercial hits.

Offline Cyclopssss

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Seems like fun. If I can get everything to work I'll probably will be joining you guys. Thanks for setting this up, Evermind.
From the ocean comes the notion that the realise lies in rhythm. The rhythm of vision is dancer, and when you dance you´re always on the one. From the looking comes to see, wondrous realise real eyes....

Offline Crow

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haha 7 PM GMT I'm gonna be at work anyways so oh well  :lol

Offline Bolsters

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Just remembered that back when we were on teamspeak the other day, even if I didn't hold the press-to-talk key, while you couldn't hear me speak, you were still able to hear my keyboard.
I haven't used it in a few years, but is it possible to have push-to-talk and voice detection enabled simultaneously? Maybe voice detection is on and too sensitive, so it turns the mic on when you type.

Offline Train of Naught

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I'll check it out later and test it with Evermiño before we start things up.
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Offline Cyclopssss

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Alright, I'm in teamspeak and testing but I can't see the channel.
From the ocean comes the notion that the realise lies in rhythm. The rhythm of vision is dancer, and when you dance you´re always on the one. From the looking comes to see, wondrous realise real eyes....

Offline Evermind

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That's because I suck at Teamspeak. :lol

The channel is back.
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Offline Train of Naught

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Don't know what's going on but I'm losing connection every other minute or something. My internet connection is fine though..

can't we do this shit through skype or something? :lol
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Offline Evermind

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Okay, since Train keeps disconnecting from the Teamspeak, we decided to hold this thing on Skype instead. I'm still sitting in Teamspeak, so if you're going to join, join the Teamspeak and we'll add you on Skype and so on.

Or maybe not, Train seems to be doing fine right now.
« Last Edit: September 21, 2016, 01:05:20 PM by Evermind »
This first band is Soen very cool swingy jazz fusion kinda stuff.

Offline Train of Naught

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No I'm not.

It's because you stopped playing Native Construct, that was the only thing to keep my connection alive
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Offline Scorpion

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This is such a clusterfuck.
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Hey, the length is fine :azn: Thanks!

Offline Evermind

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:lol

We found a solution though. I'm still in TS if anyone wants to join, starting in 5 minutes.
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Offline Scorpion

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After initial problems, this was a lot of fun! Not a bad album, but probably not something that I'll see myself coming back to too much. I'd give it a 6/10, it'd be higher if the synths weren't so a) omnipresent and b) terrible.

Also, it would at least be a 7.5/10 if the growls in The Banishment weren't the worst growls that I have ever heard.
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Offline Train of Naught

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Yeah, despite nothing on the album really standing out in a good way, the listening experience was really fun with a live chat.

never listening to The Banishment ever again though
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Offline Evermind

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Yeah, that was a lot of fun. The comments really made the listening much more alive. :lol
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Offline Train of Naught

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So the next one is on Monday right?

I like the commenting through tinychat during the album, we should keep doing that. But maybe it would be fun to use voice-chat for like a post-album discussion or something for the next one. Thoughts?

If my teamspeak keeps fucking up that'll have to go through skype though
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Offline Shadow Ninja 2.0

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Hey guys, sorry I wasn't there; I had class. I'll definitely try to be there for the next one though!

Offline Cyclopssss

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Yeah sorry guys, had to bail after something came up at home. I was under the impression the whole thing would happen one or two hours earlier so I'd made my planning on that. Turned out it took a while longer before things got going. Perhaps next time I'll have more time. Glad things turned out well in the end though.
From the ocean comes the notion that the realise lies in rhythm. The rhythm of vision is dancer, and when you dance you´re always on the one. From the looking comes to see, wondrous realise real eyes....

Offline Tomislav95

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Forgot to comment here: yep, this was really fun :tup
And I really liked the album, it's pretty good considering it's first Ayreon album. 
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I wave but they don't slow down...

Offline Evermind

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I'm going away for the weekend (leaving home in a few minutes). The next writeup is being edited, so I hope I'll be able to post it on Sunday if everything goes fine. With that in mind, we're aiming at Monday, September 26th, 7 P.M. GMT for the next listening session.
This first band is Soen very cool swingy jazz fusion kinda stuff.

Offline Cool Chris

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I only have the Timeline CD set, but I really like it! I have listened to most of the other albums via Spotify, but never bothered buying any of them. I will look forward to your write-ups!
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Offline Evermind

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Re: Arjen Lucassen Discography Thread v. Laughter kills the fear within
« Reply #66 on: September 25, 2016, 09:37:02 AM »
This isn't one of my favourite writeups—I've struggled to get it done, actually—but at least it's something.



Actual Fantasy (1996)




Release date: October 23rd, 1996
Length: 54:29 (65:44 for 1998 reissue version)


Tracklist:

1. Actual Fantasy
2. Abbey of Synn
3. The Stranger from Within
4. Computer Eyes
5. Beyond the Last Horizon
6. Farside of the World
7. Back on Planet Earth
8. Forevermore
9. The Dawn of Man (1998 reissue only)
10. The Stranger from Within (Single Version) (1998 reissue only)

Personnel:

Arjen Anthony Lucassen – production and all instruments not mentioned in the section below
Oscar Holleman – mixing and engineering

Vocalists:

Okkie Huysdens
Edward Reekers (Kayak)
Robert Soeterboek (Cotton Soeterboek Band)
David Bachwitz as ‘little boy’ on "Actual Fantasy"
Kiki Holleman as ‘baby’ on "Forevermore"

Musicians

Cleem Determeijer - synth solo on "The Stranger from Within"  and "Computer Eyes"; orchestral and string arrangements on "Actual Fantasy", "The Stranger from Within", "Back on Planet Earth" and "Forevermore"
Rene Merkelbach – Hammond organ, synth solo on "Abbey of Synn"



Sit back and relax
Crawl into the maze
Within your mind
Leave it all behind
Now allow yourself to
Slide into a world
As real as you want it to be
Actual fantasy


Actual Fantasy is one of those albums that most people who are familiar with Ayreon haven’t even listened to, or at most tried once or twice. It's certainly a unique Ayreon record, and, perhaps, not in a good way. It has the least amount of singers and instrumentalists involved. It is the only Ayreon album that doesn’t feature any conceptual story. It is the worst-selling Ayreon record to date, and it’s also the shortest. Let’s go back in 1996 and see how it happened.

History / Background

The Final Experiment was a definite success, and Hans van Vuuren—the record label head who had agreed to tackle the release of the debut album—asked Arjen to do another record. Arjen, despite having been convinced to use the Ayreon moniker, still insisted that he wouldn’t do another rock opera; therefore, he opted to create something different. Arjen decided that this time there would be no story weaved throughout the album. He insisted on using the vocals as an instrument, just like any other, with fixed melodies and steady rhythms. He invited way fewer guests on the album than he had before; only three singers and two guest keyboardists—he played the rest of instruments himself. There was no real drummer, either—the drums were all programmed, which Arjen thought was a nice contrast with the fantasy theme running through this record. He basically decided to make the album almost entirely by himself, thinking it would sell just fine based on success of The Final Experiment. In retrospect, he admits this decision was a bit arrogant.

The album didn’t take a lot of time to be recorded, mixed and mastered. It was released only a year after The Final Experiment, and the sales turned out to be considerably lower. Later, Arjen mentioned that he hoped to inspire people to once again use their own imagination, fantasies and ideas with this album, but, apparently, his intentions didn’t quite live up to reality. Perhaps people went into it expecting another rock opera in the vein of the debut. Perhaps people expected a more organic sound—Actual Fantasy ended up being a synth-heavy, vocoder-heavy album—a sound that can be seen as the opposite of inspiration for any fantasies and ideas. Perhaps the songs weren’t up to par with everyone’s expectations. Or maybe it was a combination of all these factors. All in all, the album wasn’t quite a failure—the sales were still enough to cover the expenses and be profitable—especially since the album ended up being a lot cheaper without a drummer and only a few musicians on board. Yet it wasn’t anywhere close to The Final Experiment’s level of success.

However, it doesn’t mean there aren’t some hidden, overlooked gems on this album.

Plot

As mentioned before, there isn’t a continuous story on this record. Instead, each song is based on a separate story, some taken from the movies, some invented by Arjen himself. In order not to bloat this section, I’ll provide a few interesting examples here, and you can find full descriptions of each song in the booklet. I’ll also talk about them at the next listening session.

So, Abbey of Synn is based on a 1986 movie called Name of the Rose, which is in turn based on a novel by Umberto Eco. The events take place in a monastery where laughter is forbidden. The monks die in strange circumstances day by day, and soon they find a comedy book written by Aristotle, which all the victims apparently were reading. It is revealed that the book’s pages are poisoned, and licking a finger to turn the page proves fatal.

Beyond the Last Horizon is based on a story Arjen came up with during the last few days of his father’s life. The story is set in Middle Ages, during the crusades. One of the crusaders is ambushed and killed, and he sees a light at the end of a long road on the horizon. He proudly rides towards the light to find out what awaits him beyond it, but beyond this last horizon is nothing but death. He realizes this in time to gather his last strength and fight his way back to life.

Back on Planet Earth is based on another one of Arjen’s stories. This story details a young boy’s life on a space station in the future. Emotion is a thing of the past, but the boy overhears some older residents of the station speaking of that past, a time when humans lived on planet Earth. Using a computer on board the station, he seeks out information on Earth. What he finds is a chronicle of all the beautiful features found there, but also the turbulent and war-torn history that led to Earth's destruction, and forced humans to move to space to survive. Viewing how people once lived, with laughter and other emotional responses, the boy concludes he would have rather stayed and died on Earth, than live out life on the cold, unfeeling space station. You should remember that there were no plans about the overarching Ayreon story at this time, so this song doesn’t necessarily refer to anything related to it. However, Arjen himself admitted this song must have influenced him to write one particular song—I won’t say which one in case you’re unfamiliar with it yet—from one of the later Ayreon albums, The Dream Sequencer.

Music
 
As I mentioned in a few paragraphs above, the music on this album is consistently synthesizer-heavy. Now, all Ayreon albums are synthesizer-heavy, but Actual Fantasy is also very dark and computer-sounding. The programmed drums also do their share to make the sound even colder. The use of the distorted vocals here and there adds to that, too, and since the melodies for all singers were fixed and allowed no improvisation, they sound quite lifeless in some songs. Distorted vocals are an interesting subject here. Later, after Into the Electric Castle was released. Arjen would say he avoided distorting anyone’s voice without their agreement. During the Actual Fantasy mixing and mastering, however, Arjen applied some distortion to Edward Reekers’ voice, and while the singer didn’t say anything, Arjen later stated that he felt Edward didn’t particularly like it.

To ensure a diversity of atmosphere Arjen invited three singers to perform on this album. Edward Reekers was invited for the melodic parts, as you can hear on the quiet beginning of Abbey of Synn, and the choruses on Computer Eyes and Beyond the Last Horizon. Robert Soeterbroek was hired for powerful and low vocal parts—the rhythmic verses of Beyond the Last Horizon, which sound almost like guitar riffs, are the best example. Okkie Huysdens was picked for the choral passages and some ad libs. His most noticeable parts are the verses on Abbey of Synn and The Stranger from Within.

The resulting sound was certainly way different from The Final Experiment.

Actual Fantasy Revisited

When Arjen switched to InsideOut label—more on that later—the reissues of all previous Ayreon albums were released. This provided a perfect chance to revisit and promote Actual Fantasy, which was still the worst-selling album in the Ayreon discography. Arjen wanted to mix the album in 5.1—which was rather difficult, since eight years later some of the original recorded parts were missing—and he wanted to use real drums now. Ed Warby, who will appear in our write-ups soon enough, agreed to do the job. Funnily enough, he recalls mentioning that Actual Fantasy needed real drums from the beginning, even before he became friends with Arjen.

The songs from this revisited version also underwent some tweaks here and there. The real flute by Ewa Albering was added to the intro track instead of a sample one, and there were some ad libs inserted into several songs.

My Thoughts

If you’ve read it this far, you can probably guess my thoughts about this album. This is my least favourite Ayreon album by a mile, and, therefore, this write-up was way more difficult and demanding to write than The Final Experiment one. It’s not easy to write about the music you don’t like and still come up with something constructive and engaging.

I think the absence of continuous story hurts this album, but it’s not the biggest issue it has, not by far. My main complaint is about the music, which is too electronic and too cold for my taste. There are only a few memorable vocal melodies. Most of the songs just trudge along with vocal melodies that sound not unlike those synths supporting them. There are some great parts, like the choruses in Abbey of Synn and Beyond the Last Horizon, and there are some enjoyable keyboard and guitar solos. Back on Planet Earth is solid all the way through in most aspects, but it loses me with those vocoder-edited vocals. I also felt the lyrics on Actual Fantasy were especially unimpressive by Arjen’s standards. I think the fact he made this album less than in a year might influenced all this too.

I’ve recently bought the revisited edition of this record, mostly because I wanted to complete my collection. The real drums indeed sound better than the drum machine, but overall, my opinion on the album didn’t significantly rise as a result of the revisited version. Arjen says he still thinks it’s a great album after all these years, but, honestly, I would’ve been surprised if he said otherwise. As for me, I like this album for what it is. Arjen tried to do something that wasn’t obvious at that time, and he succeeded in doing that. And yet, in my opinion, he failed to write a good album. The intentions matter, but the music matters more, and with Actual Fantasy, the music is a big miss for me.

Don’t let this opinion discourage you, though. Listen for yourself and let us know your own thoughts about this record.
This first band is Soen very cool swingy jazz fusion kinda stuff.

Offline Train of Naught

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Re: Arjen Lucassen Discography Thread v. Laughter kills the fear within
« Reply #67 on: September 25, 2016, 09:52:52 AM »
Okay.. I'm going into the listening session tomorrow completely blind again, but "synth-heavy" tells me I will not be enjoying this one too much, judging from the synths on that other album. :lol

I guess this one not being as long is a massive perk though
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Offline Cyclopssss

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Re: Arjen Lucassen Discography Thread v. Laughter kills the fear within
« Reply #68 on: September 25, 2016, 10:30:18 AM »
Funny, this is actually one of my favourite Ayreon albums.
From the ocean comes the notion that the realise lies in rhythm. The rhythm of vision is dancer, and when you dance you´re always on the one. From the looking comes to see, wondrous realise real eyes....

Offline Tomislav95

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Re: Arjen Lucassen Discography Thread v. Laughter kills the fear within
« Reply #69 on: September 25, 2016, 10:39:55 AM »
I will try my best to listen to this this evening. And I believe I will be able to join listening session tomorrow. 
...the years just pass like trains
I wave but they don't slow down...