Systematic Chaos vs. Black Clouds

[ronnibran]

A Nightmare to Remember > Dark Eternal Night
Rite of Passage > Constant Motion
Wither > Forsaken
Repentance > The Shattered Fortress
Count of Tuscany > In the Presence of Enemies


BCSL is the easy winner in my books.  Repentance is the only REALLY good song on SC, to me.  Not looking at it in the song to song comparison, I only enjoy Repentance and In the Presence of Enemies off of SC.  The rest of the cd I usually skip over (I don't listen to it very often).  BCSL, on the other hand, there's no songs I don't like.  That said, only A Nightmare To Remember is in my list of favorite DT songs.  It still doesn't reach the coolness of earlier albums, IMO, but doesn't have weak points like SC.

[SnakeEyes]

Black Clouds by a landslide, in my opinion.  I think SC is an awful album, lyrically, sonically, etc.  It does nothing for me at all.  Don't get me wrong, I don't love Black Clouds, either, but I think it was a step in the right direction.  

[toro]

BC&SL by a long shot.

A Nightmare to Remembervs. The Dark Eternal Night(TDEN just kind of sucks)

A Rite of Passage vs. Constant Motion(CM is better AROP is so boring)

Wither vs. Forsaken(Wither 'cause its beautiful and Forsaken is DT's WORST SONG EVER)

The Shattered Fortress vs. Repentance(Repentance is  )

The Best of Times vs. The Ministry of Lost Souls(I don't like those song but the solo in TBOT is better )

The Count of Tuscany vs. In the Presence of Enemies(The Count even with those silly lyrics)

[KevShmev]

TBOT just doesn't go anywhere. The verses are all very similar in sound. The solo is, of course, stunning, and the first riff is pretty cool, but it doesn't make up for the rest of the song.

I get the impression that the music was almost an afterthought - MP regarded his lyrics as much more important (which I can sort of understand).

In regards to this, first off, all of the verses in a song sounding similar is pretty common in a song with the standard verse-chorus-verse-chorus-etc. format, which "The Best of Times" has, even with all of the decoration around it.

Second, if you consider the "The fleeting winds of time" section a verse, then I don't see how that verse sounds like the verses in the first half of the song.  And if you don't consider it a verse, then there are only two verses in the song, to which I would say, "What is the big deal about two verses in a 13-minute song sounding the same?"

[LieLowTheWantedMan]

Is it just me or is the word day/days used so much in tBoT that it's annoying?

[Perpetual Change]

lol. Where's PetFish at?

[Keyboardframe]

Black Clouds by a landslide, in my opinion.  I think SC is an awful album, lyrically, sonically, etc.  It does nothing for me at all.  Don't get me wrong, I don't love Black Clouds, either, but I think it was a step in the right direction.  

This exactly.

[Voyage 34]

Black Clouds by a landslide, in my opinion.  I think SC is an awful album, lyrically, sonically, etc.  It does nothing for me at all.  Don't get me wrong, I don't love Black Clouds, either, but I think it was a step in the right direction.  

This exactly.

Yup. When I saw DT open for Maiden I really wished they had played for more than 45 minutes. I wished even more that that sucktastic song Constant Motion didn't take up valuable time in that way-too-short set. Black Clouds at least has songs that I will listen to, SC doesn't.

[SystematicThought]

Concerning the days/day in TBOT, PetFish, I was really feeling bad for you when that happened. I don't know if he will read this, but I felt horrible for you.

[orcus116]

Especially the way he worded it to. Everything was really spot on but just because of the subject matter of the song anything that might've been even thought about being thought about being maybe slightly negative was cast down upon. He clearly wasn't trying to be offensive but they can get rather ravenous over there, sorry Wey.

[hefdaddy42]

TBOT just doesn't go anywhere. The verses are all very similar in sound. The solo is, of course, stunning, and the first riff is pretty cool, but it doesn't make up for the rest of the song.

I get the impression that the music was almost an afterthought - MP regarded his lyrics as much more important (which I can sort of understand).

Hard to be that way when the music was all done before any lyrics were written.

[Aquila Chrysaetos]

I think I'm one of the few here who actually enjoys both albums

On topic, I'd say BC&SL is an overall better album, but the best song of the 2 albums to me, is ITPOE part 1.

[Global Laziness]

I'll list the songs along with how I rank them in Dream Theater's catalogue (out of 94 songs):

A Nightmare to Remember (6th) - The Dark Eternal Night (31st)
A Rite of Passage (75th) - Constant Motion (39th)
Wither (54th) - Forsaken (77th)
The Shattered Fortress (42nd) - Repentance (78th)
The Best of Times (70th)- The Ministry of Lost Souls (45th)
The Count of Tuscany (16th) - In the Presence of Enemies (25th)

Of Dream Theater's ten albums, I rank Black Clouds at #4 and Systematic Chaos at #8.

[Moonchild]

I'll bite. SC might be a weak pale face of DT but it's better than ToT and WDADU on my book.

A Nightmare to Remember - Dark Eternal Night (There are great parts on ANTR and it should have been a 10 minute song. DEN as a novelty act works but fuck it's also a embarrassing song)
Rite of Passage - Constant Motion (much like ANTR it should have been shorter and it's reminiscent to PMU - not a bad thing - CM is just meh, there are better copies of metallica outhere.
Wither - Forsaken (I like both songs and it wasn't for the piano version of Wither I wouldn't appreciate the album version, and Forsaken would have won this round)
Repentance - The Shattered Fortress (I have lately listened to TSF a lot but Repentence is a much better song, the guitar solo is godlike)
The Best of Times - The Ministry of Lost Souls (I just don't get TMOLS, it's probably the only DT song I lose track of time or focus - starts all epic, has a great build up and chorus,  *blank*, I wake up with the great solo part in the middle,*blank*, wtf, not so good ending. TBOT has an old DT feel and it makes lyrical sense and it's correctly structured, top 5 solo too.)
The Count of Tuscany - In the Presence of Enemies (I fell in love with TCOT even with the crappy lyrics, top 3 epic song while ITPOE has a great first part and beginning of the second but they fucking lost me with the reckoning, the ending could have been so awesome..)

[jsem]

Black Clouds at least has songs that I will listen to, SC doesn't.

This.

The only song on SC that I listen to is the magical ITPOE pt. 1 - the rest is crap

[theusualmadness]

BCSL is my least favorite album, although I like them all.