Falling into Infinity is amazing

[Dani Helios]

Terrbile songs: Almost All
Good songs: Trial of Tears

*hides face with hands* "don't hurt me..."

Hell's Kitchen, Lines In The Sand  would like to see you now. 

Having just listened to it on the bus back from school, Hell's Kitchen is good, I'm not a fan of lines in the sand tho 

[Kotowboy]

Lines in the sand is my 2nd favourite song after Octavarium.


Dat Solo.

[Mindflux]

Lines in the sand is my 2nd favourite song after Octavarium.


Dat Solo.

LITS is up there for sure.

[Dani Helios]

I have vastly different opinions to most people here, though.

[Kotowboy]

I have vastly different opinions to most people here, though.

Most people do !

I for one think Awake is really boring !

[hefdaddy42]

LITS is amazing.

[Dani Helios]

I have vastly different opinions to most people here, though.

Most people do !

I for one think Awake is really boring !

That was a risky thing to say!

[KevShmev]

I for one think Awake is really boring !

[Zantera]

I listened to Falling Into Infinity quite recently, and it is very underrated. 5th best DT album, I'd say.

[matthewmatt]

I have listened to the album a lot lately (three times just yesterday) and... I really like it. More than before. In fact, from a certain point of view, I might actually consider it the most consistent and interesting 90's DT album. Yes, that includes Scenes. But then again, like I said, only from a certain point of view. Peruvian Skies, Hell's Kitchen, Lines in the Sand and Trial are absolutely astonishing, really. Hollow Years is one of the best DT ballads, IMHO, and I really don't get the hate against both Burning My Soul and You Not Me - from the way everybody talks about them you would expect N*SYNC or something... when really those are solid songs, that maybe are too radio-oriented... but aren't Wither or The Spirit Carries On too, then?
If anything, this album suffers from the abundance of ballads, but so does ADTOE. And the production is really cool. This album definitely needs more love!

[Onno]

I listened to it a week or so ago after not listening to it for... what, a year at least. I liked it worse than the last time I heard it. There are a few good songs on there and a few amazing ones (LitS, ToT) but there's a lot of songs that I just don't really like.

[Kotowboy]

Falling Into Infinity > Awake.


Flame Resistant Armour Activated.

[pcs90]

There are a few of their best songs on here. It's certainly much better than SC in my opinion. LITS, TOT, and HK are fantastic.

[Kotowboy]

I for one think Awake is really boring !

Oh you've convinced me otherwise with a GIF.

[TheCountOfNYC]

Trial of Tears and Lines in the Sand are Top 50 DT songs for sure. The rest of the album is pretty good as well. It's my least favorite in their discography but that says more about how great DT's body of work is than it does about FII. I think that it's a great album regardless of where it is in my rankings.

[BlobVanDam]

Falling Into Infinity > Awake.


Flame Resistant Armour Activated.

I will protect you!

FII is an album that to this day I still appreciate more and more every time I listen to it, to the point where it may even just nudge out IaW for a top 3 spot, and I fucking love IaW.

[IDontNotDoThings]

New Millenium -
You Not Me - 
Peruvian Skies - 
Hollow Years - 
Burning My Soul - 
Hell's Kitchen - 
Lines In The Sand -
Take Away My Pain -
Just Let Me Breathe - 
Anna Lee - 
Trial Of Tears - 

6:00 -
Caught In A Web - 
Innocence Faded  -
A Mind Beside Itself (all of it) -
The Mirror -
Lie -   
Lifting Shadows - 
Scarred -
Space-Dye Vest - 

I prefer Awake

[Train of Naught]

Used to dislike both FII and Awake, almost all of it, but looking back, I really don't know why I disliked FII that much, they put out more songs than ever on any album, and there's only 2 or 3 letdowns imo.

As for Awake,

I for one think Awake is really boring !

Not everything guys, just: Innocence Faded, Lifting Shadows, Erotomania, The Silent Man.

[Enalya]

You know what, I really tried to like it or get into it. It just doesn't happen. I dislike most of the vocal parts on this album. It definitely has some good (instrumental) parts, but some refrains really annoy me (especially where MP sings in the background, which I always dislike). Besides half of SC, this is their only album that doesn't work for me, so fortunately there's still enough DT for me!

I am really happy that a lot of people like it though

[abydos]

What's not to like about Take Away My Pain, Anna Lee ?

[Train of Naught]

Anna Lee is awesome, Take Away My Pain? 

[IDontNotDoThings]

What's not to like about Take Away My Pain, Anna Lee ?

Anna Lee is awesome, Take Away My Pain? 

Didn't think I was in the minority on that one, but oh well, I'll explain.

For Anna Lee:
Nothing about it gives me anything I can't already got from Another Day, Surrounded, To Live Forever, Lifting Shadows, etc. I don't feel like I get anything new here, so I just kinda get bored. I can understand why some people would like it, since those are good songs, but I don't take anything away from it after I listen to it, & it feels so watered-down in production that I have no reason to come back to it. So as I said, I get bored. If Speak To Me made it onto FII, this would be the first song I'd think to replace. 

For Take Away My Pain:
This was a bit of a weird one for me. When I first heard it, I couldn't pinpoint what I disliked so much about it, but I knew for a fact that I did in fact dislike it (even now, I had to open the song in another tab to write this). In the verses, although they're relatively quiet, nothing seems to fit together quite right. The main riff sounds dizzy & confused (like they made it up on the spot & looped it, it's played very subpar), the bass sound is god-awful (it dominates way too much when it's there & it sounds too rough, buzzy & springy (if that makes sense) to blend in at all), the drums are good but hardly noticeable & feel a bit too active for what's supposed to be slower, more relaxed section of a slower, more relaxed song. Honestly, James seems like the only one who knows what he's doing. Then it builds up to the chorus, which is a total anticlimax. It lacks any power that a built-up chorus should have & the way it treats itself like some kind of epic statement that's going to move the hearts of millions is just frustrating & obnoxious because I don't hear it in the slightest. When I first heard it, this was easily in my bottom 5 DT songs, but now that I think about it, it's an easy #1.

But whatever, opinions, I'm in the minority it seems. *copy-pasting to controversial opinions forum*

Edit: Forgot to mention that the demo to TAMP is WAAAAY better than the studio version. Just throwing that out there .

[Rodni Demental]

The problem with FII is that it's inconsistent. Not to give the wrong impression, I actually find it to be a classic now as it really represents an aspect of DT that they probably needed to express at the time after the previous 3 albums which were in general, pretty busy and full on albums. It's got some great songs though, and even some great moments in the not so preferable songs.

For me the anomalies are You Not Me, Take Away My Pain and Hollow Years. Not necessarily bad songs but there's definitely something weird about them that I struggle to resonate with, I've felt this way since I first heard them and believe me, I've tried to like them. I might have convinced myself that I kinda do sometimes but still can't shake something being a bit 'off' about them, but clearly I'm not expressing myself very well here. I assume some others might have felt this way about these tracks but I dunno. Haha..

And then there's the fact that some songs took a while to grow for me, so the first impression of the album took a bit of work to get to the 'classic' status that it seems to have now. New Millennium, Just Let Me Breathe, Lines in the Sand and even Trial of Tears were growers for me.

I think the only ones I properly enjoyed from the first listen were Peruvian Skies, Burning my Soul, Anna Lee and Hell's Kitchen. Yeah, I'm kinda dumbfounded that I didn't click with Lines in the Sand and New Millennium because they're quite possibly top 10 (or 20) songs for me now, and to a similar extent ToT but not quite as good as LITS and NM.

[Train of Naught]

What's not to like about Take Away My Pain, Anna Lee ?

Anna Lee is awesome, Take Away My Pain? 

Didn't think I was in the minority on that one, but oh well, I'll explain.

For Anna Lee:
Nothing about it gives me anything I can't already got from Another Day, Surrounded, To Live Forever, Lifting Shadows, etc. I don't feel like I get anything new here, so I just kinda get bored. I can understand why some people would like it, since those are good songs, but I don't take anything away from it after I listen to it, & it feels so watered-down in production that I have no reason to come back to it. So as I said, I get bored. If Speak To Me made it onto FII, this would be the first song I'd think to replace. 

For Take Away My Pain:
This was a bit of a weird one for me. When I first heard it, I couldn't pinpoint what I disliked so much about it, but I knew for a fact that I did in fact dislike it (even now, I had to open the song in another tab to write this). In the verses, although they're relatively quiet, nothing seems to fit together quite right. The main riff sounds dizzy & confused (like they made it up on the spot & looped it, it's played very subpar), the bass sound is god-awful (it dominates way too much when it's there & it sounds too rough, buzzy & springy (if that makes sense) to blend in at all), the drums are good but hardly noticeable & feel a bit too active for what's supposed to be slower, more relaxed section of a slower, more relaxed song. Honestly, James seems like the only one who knows what he's doing. Then it builds up to the chorus, which is a total anticlimax. It lacks any power that a built-up chorus should have & the way it treats itself like some kind of epic statement that's going to move the hearts of millions is just frustrating & obnoxious because I don't hear it in the slightest. When I first heard it, this was easily in my bottom 5 DT songs, but now that I think about it, it's an easy #1.

But whatever, opinions, I'm in the minority it seems. *copy-pasting to controversial opinions forum*

Edit: Forgot to mention that the demo to TAMP is WAAAAY better than the studio version. Just throwing that out there .

Maybe I wasn't very clear, I STRONGLY dislike TAMP, and I think we're not in the minority at all.

[Stadler]

First, I haven't gone back to read the whole thread, so if any of this is deja vu all over again, I apologize.

Second, any discussion of this album HAS to include the Ytsejam "Director's Cut" of this record.  I listen to that  more than the original release (in part because it has my favorite DT song of all time, "Cover My Eyes", on it).

I strongly like this album.   Not in my Top 3, but good record.

[pcs90]

For me the anomalies are You Not Me, Take Away My Pain and Hollow Years. Not necessarily bad songs but there's definitely something weird about them that I struggle to resonate with, I've felt this way since I first heard them and believe me, I've tried to like them.

Do you feel similarly about the 2004 live version of Hollow Years, or just the album version? To be honest I prefer JR's solo piano version of that particular song by a lot, but just curious if the more 'electric' version with the extended solo would have fit better on the album instead of the original?

[jakepriest]

I've been listening to FII a bit lately and I have to say, my least favourite song on the album is actually Lines in the Sand. I dislike the intro, main verse riffs and mainly the vocals in the chorus. I will admit the solo is amazing though, too bad it's in an otherwise terrible song.

[Train of Naught]

You like You Not Me better than LitS?

[As I Am]

If only they'd return to that sound, I'd be one happy camper!

GREAT ALBUM! Not flawless (you Not Me), but damn close!

[Stadler]

I've been listening to FII a bit lately and I have to say, my least favourite song on the album is actually Lines in the Sand. I dislike the intro, main verse riffs and mainly the vocals in the chorus. I will admit the solo is amazing though, too bad it's in an otherwise terrible song.

You like You Not Me better than LitS?

Count me in on those that don't like LITS.  For me, it's okay but the guest vocals ruin it.   So yes, I like YNM more than LITS, even with the cheesy, over-emoted vocals in the chorus ("It's all about YYYYEEEEEEEEEUUUUUUUUUWWWW, not MEEEEAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYY".)   

[Ben_Jamin]

I'd actually enjoy You Not Me more if they kept the middle section from the demo.

[As I Am]

For me, the PERFECT FII album would be to take off "You Not Me" & "Hollow Years" and replace with "Raise The Knife". Then switch "TAMP" & "LITS" with their demo versions instead.

[Sacul]

I prefer this album a bit more than I&W.

[jakepriest]

You like You Not Me better than LitS?

1. Trial Of Tears
2. Peruvian Skies
3. Hell's Kitchen
4. Take Away My Pain
5. You Not Me

[Cool Chris]

I remember liking You Not Me when the album first came out. It was different, and a full album of songs like that would be awful, but it was a good song. It is still not the worst song on the album, let alone the worst DT song.

Second, any discussion of this album HAS to include the Ytsejam "Director's Cut" of this record. 

It doesn't really. That is just an under-produced, extended version of mediocrity.

...Lines in the Sand. I dislike the intro, main verse riffs and mainly the vocals in the chorus. I will admit the solo is amazing though, too bad it's in an otherwise terrible song.

Sums up my feelings. That intro might have been a good idea, but it is lame and goes on way, way too long; and the backing vocals are terrible. They don't fit a DT song, and having a guest vocalist of that style was a bad idea from the beginning.