In what order did you first hear each album?

[Riceball]

I was thinking about the divergance of opinion when it comes to rating DTs 10 studio albums on the forum, and it got me thinking: would the order that you first listened to each album have an effect on which album/s is/are your favourite?

For example, my "first listen order" is:

Scenes from a Memory
Octavarium (on release)
Train of Thought
Images and Words
Falling into Infinity
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulance
When Dream and Day Unite
Awake
Systematic Chaos (on release)
Black Clouds & Silver Linings (on release)

The first three albums are in my top five, with Images & Words and Six Degrees filling the 2 and 4 spots respectively.

How about you? What was your 'initial listening order' and do you think it affected your album ranking and/or perception of a given album?

[scoutmasterdave]

I don't think the order in which I heard each album has impacted my opinion much.  I was smitten not long after ACoS was released, so I've heard everything since then upon release.  My favorites are 6DoIT, SFAM, Awake, and I&W (in no particular order).  I think their last few albums have been a tad stale, but I know I'm not alone in that opinion.

Images and Words
A Change of Seasons
Awake
When Dream and Day Unite
Falling into Infinity (on release)
Scenes from a Memory (on release)
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulance (on release)
Train of Thought (on release)
Octavarium (on release)
Systematic Chaos (on release)
Black Clouds & Silver Linings (on release)

[Metrovarium]

BC&SL
Octavarium
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence
Train of Thought
Systematic Chaos
Scenes From A Memory
Awake
Images and Words
Falling Into Infinity
When Dream and Day Unite

Looking at the list, I don't think my listening order affected my favored/disliked albums much. That's especially true because in general, I listened to the albums backwards chronologically. Though BC&SL is tied for first place (with SFAM) for me, so perhaps listening to it first affected my opinion of it.

[Schleppy]

Scenes from a Memory
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence
Awake
Images and Words
Falling into Infinity
Train of Thought
When Dream and Day Unite
Octavarium (on release)
Systematic Chaos (on release)
Black Clouds and Silver Linings (on release)

[Implode]

Octavarium
Images and Words
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence
Awake
Train of Thought
Scenes from a Memory
Black Clouds & Silver Linings
A Change of Seasons
Systematic Chaos
Falling into Infinity
When Dream a Day Unite

I don't think the order influenced anything. My tastes coincide with the majority I think.

[YouMakeMeSick]

Been a fan since '92:

Images & Words
When Dream And Day Unite
Live At The Marquee
Awake A Change Of Seasons
Falling Into Infinity
Once In A Livetime
Scenes From A Memory
Live Scenes From New York
Six Degrees Of Inner Turbulence
Train Of Thought
Live At Budokan
Octavarium
Score
Systematic Chaos
Chaos In Motion
Black Clouds & Silver Linings

[Bolsters]

To the best of my knowledge, if I remember correctly:

Images and Words
Awake
Scenes From A Memory
Train of Thought
Six Degrees
Falling Into Infinity
When Dream and Day Unite

I became a fan between Train of Though and Octavarium, so after that I've listened to them in order of release:

Octavarium
Systematic Chaos
Black Clouds

[SystematicThought]

Fan since October 2008. Order I heard was, I believe:

Systematic Chaos (October 2008)
Octavarium (November 2008)
Scenes From A Memory (November 2008)
Images and Words (December 2008)
When Dream And Day Unite (December 2008)
Train of Thought (December 26th 2008)
A Change of Seasons (January 2nd 2009)
Awake (January 2nd 2009)
Falling Into Infinity (January 2nd 2009)
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence (January 2nd 2009)
Black Clouds and Silver Linings (June 24th 2009)

Those dates are when I bought them and when I listened to them. I bought that group from January back in December 26th as one bundle order from Amazon. The day I became a Dream Theater fan was October 8th 2008 after playing Constant Motion on Rock Band, I bought SC that next day

[Gadough]

Basically, the order I bought them:

1. Images and Words
2. Black Clouds
3. Train of Thought
4. Octavarium
5. Systematic Chaos
6. Scenes
7. Six Degrees
8. Awake
9. Falling Into Infinity
10. Change of Seasons
11. WDADU

[reo73]

Fan since '92 when PMU hit MTV and the local hard rock station.  Listened to all the studio albums starting with I&W plus live albums & videos by release date with the exception of fitting in WD&DU sometime after Awake.

[Nick]

1. Train of Thought
2. Awake
2. Scenes From a Memory
4. When Dream and Day Unite
5. Images and Words
6. Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence
6. Falling Into Infinity
8. Ocatavarium
9. Systematic Chaos
10. Black Clouds and Silver Linings

[zxlkho]

I&W
SFAM
Octavarium
ToT
SDOIT
Black Clouds
Awake
Systematic Chaos
ACOS
FII

[blackngold29]

Live at Budokan
Awake
A Change of Seasons
Images and Words
The rest (really, I have no clue)

[ricky]

Damn, this is gonna take some thought.

scenes
awake
train
8v
fii
images
Six
acos
all the others

that's an approximation. keep in mind im trying to go back to  '05.

[lucky7]

All after 2005....

Train of thought
Scenes from a memory
Octavarium
Images and Words
A change of seasons
Live in Budokan
Six degrees of inner turbulence
Score
Falling into Infinity
Awake
Systematic Chaos
Black Clouds and Silver Lining
When dream and day unite

[psychdoc]

Freshman year of high school (1992) started it all with Images And Words, followed by:

When Dream And Day Unite
Awake
A Change Of Seasons
Falling Into Infinity
Scenes From A Memory (ok, an EP and not technically an album)
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence
Train Of Thought
Octavarium
Systematic Chaos
Black Clouds And Silver Linings

[The Silent Cody]

1. Awake
2. some songs from Images & Words
3. A Change Of Seasons
3. Scenes From A Memory (on a cassette )
4. Images & Words
5. 6DOIT
6. Falling Into Infinity
7. When Dream And Day Unite
8. Train Of Thought (on release)
9. Octavarium (on release)
10. Systematic Chaos (on release)
11. Black Clouds & Silver Linings (on release)

[tri.ad]

1. Images And Words
2. Awake
3. Octavarium
4. SDOIT
5. SFAM
6. FII
7. WDADU
8. TOT
---
9. SC
10. BCASL

[Ħ]

I had to guess it together, but this is what I came up with:

1. Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence
2. Elements of Persuasion Octavarium
3. Images and Words (not positive about this)
4. Scenes From a Memory
5. Awake
6. Train of Thought (not positive about this)
7.. Falling Into Infinity
8. Systematic Chaos (when it came out)
9. When Dream and Day Unite
10. Black Clouds and Silver Linings (when it came out)

[liquidtension]

Images and Words
When Dream and Day Unite
A Change of Seasons
Awake
Falling into Infinity
Scenes from a Memory
Six Degrees of Inner Turbulance
Train of Thought
Octavarium
Systematic Chaos
Black Clouds & Silver Linings

With the exception of WDaDU, I bought all on release.  I heard Pull Me Under on radio (!?!?) and was blown away.  I hunted around town for a couple weeks before finding the disc in a small Tower Records.  I can't think of any initial album purchase by an artist that impacted me that greatly.  I found a promo tape of WDaDU and thought it was fair and didn't really give it much chance.  Awake blew me away.  Thus, the first two JLB albums are my faves.  All others have had to "take the time" to grow on me.  I think I'm as anxious for the new cd as I've ever been for a DT platter.

[champbassist]

Octavarium
Awake
I&W
WDDU
SFAM
ACoS
ToT
FII
SDOIT
SC
BC&SL

Fan since I bought Octavarium in late '05.

[Ben_Jamin]

Scenes From A Memory
Octavarium
Train of Thought
6DOIT
Images and Words
When Dream and Day Unite
Falling Into Infinity
Awake

[Adami]

SFAM
I&W
Awake
FII
6DOIT
ToT
8vm
SC
BCSL


No clue when I first heard WDADU,

[elmatto]

Honestly....images and words was my first. I had actually heard of them a long loooooong time ago on the website RPGWorld when I was in highschool in the late 90's. Ian made a post about them. I don't remember what it was about. I think it was something about 6 degrees of inner turbulence. I remember being intrigued...but I was still rather young and my attention span was kind of short lived.
But yeah. Eventually I wanted to try some new music...and I remembered dream theater interesting me. So I looked up all their albums on Amazon. I read reviews. Saw what people were saying. So I made the choice to start with their first major album.
It's still my favorite one of all.
But from there I was hooked. And I went to Awake, then scenes from a memory, then falling into infinity, Change of seasons, then six degrees, then train of thought (which I didn't like too much. Its ok though). That was the time they were working on octavarium. So there you go.
Although being that this is truly my favorite band....I still have not listened to when dream and day unite. I keep meaning to.
hmmmm...
time to change that. I've purchased all their albums....sooooooo off to amazon.

[voncorn]

-

[The Silent Cody]

(...)
2. Elements of Persuasion Octavarium
(...)

same as me   

[Perpetual Change]

Must have been something like:

Awake (Around 2004?)
LIT/5YIALT (weeks later)
Images and Words (Some more time later)
Train of Thought "
Scenes from a Memory "


After that it's a big blur. I have all the main stuff and most of the live stuff now. Everything since Octavarium has been gotten on release.

[wolfking]

ACOS
IAW
FII
A
WDADU
SFAM
SDOIT
TOT
8VM
SC
BC&SL

[MajorMatt]

I&W
SFAM
Awake
ACoS
FII
SDOIT
WDADU
ToT
8V
SC
BC&SL

I think?

[Metro]

I started with SC then worked my way backward. Then BC&SL when it was released.

[EstyMaJ]

Im Old so I have heard then as in order of year they were released LOL

[Bill Carson]

I remember seeing the video for Another Day on Noisy Mothers (UK rock show). What caught my ear was the picking speed of JP....sad I know.
Anyway I had a choice of getting Images & Words or going for their first release, WDADU.
Luckily went with Images and I've been hooked ever since. Honestly feel that if I would of heard WDADU first, certainly wouldn't of been so enthusiastic about them.
Heard each of their subsequent albums on release.

[King Postwhore]

Heard Pull Me under in 1992 and that was it!!

Images & Words
When Dream And Day Unite
Live At The Marquee
Awake A Change Of Seasons
Falling Into Infinity
Once In A Livetime
Scenes From A Memory
Live Scenes From New York
Six Degrees Of Inner Turbulence
Train Of Thought
Live At Budokan
Octavarium
Score
Systematic Chaos
Chaos In Motion
Black Clouds & Silver Linings

[unspoken]

Fan since 2002. My brother studied at Berklee and introduced me to their music.  Apparently they still are pretty legendary up there. The first two songs I ever heard from them were Glass Prison and Blind Faith. It blew me away.

1. SDOIT
2. Scenes
3. TOT
4. I&W
5. Awake
6. FII
7. Octavarium
8. Systematic Chaos
9. Black Clouds

I don't remember when I first heard the rest of their recordings (Change of Seasons, live performances).

[inoku]

i heard DT for the first time in 1995 i think.
so

1. IAW, Awake, ACOS. i bought all three of them in the same time
2. WDADU
3-9. FII - BCASL