Official DT Top 50 Thread Mark II (bss4life15 up now - starting page 79)

[senecadawg2]

So far, this list has been very solid. Misunderstood is great fun.

[BlobVanDam]

Definitely a weird batch. Another Won and TKH don't belong in a top anything list. Misunderstood and TROAE are great picks though.

[BlackInk]

Another Won is pretty much my least favorite Dream Theater song. The Root of All evil and Misunderstood is great though.

[Ruba]

The Killing Hand!

I get a lot of goosebumps when I sing Exodus.

Misunderstood is also awesome.

[namgalsipsclar]

Nice to see The Killing Hand on here, although a bit low. LaBries performance of that song is probably my favourite vocal performance ever 

[Mladen]

Of these five, only Wait for sleep would be in my top 50. And not that high...

[Nekov]

Weird batch.   

This. Not sure if any of those would make my top 50

Speaking of which, can you add me to the list hef?

[TheGreatPretender]

I like the Killing Hand, but you really get goosebumps on the 'haaaaaaaaand' part? Seriously? Because Charlie didn't pull that part off very well at all. Heck, he had to switch to falsetto to reach that note. Kinda eliminates all chances of goosebumps for me.

Misunderstood is about right. Not their best song, but definitely noteworthy enough to be in the middle-ish of the top 50 list.

[SomeoneLikeHim]

I like the Killing Hand, but you really get goosebumps on the 'haaaaaaaaand' part? Seriously? Because Charlie didn't pull that part off very well at all. Heck, he had to switch to falsetto to reach that note. Kinda eliminates all chances of goosebumps for me.

Misunderstood is about right. Not their best song, but definitely noteworthy enough to be in the middle-ish of the top 50 list.

I'm pretty sure he was referring to the LATM version.

[TheGreatPretender]

I'm pretty sure he was referring to the LATM version.

That would make more sense. I'm really tired.

[Elite]

Yeah, I was definitely referring to the Live at the Marquee version 

[FlyingBIZKIT]

Misunderstood 


Also, Another Won 

I love the Score version so much.

[hefdaddy42]

I would rank Another Won # 1

















































among the Majesty Demo songs.

[Elite]

5 more songs and we say goodbye to yet another album..
I'm glad to see the love for Another Won 

25. Breaking All Illusions
The longest song on the latest album and boy is it beautiful. This song really has everything, going through all the Dream Theater standards. It has awesome riffs, great melodies, lyrics that are incomprehensible, badass heavy parts, soothing soft parts and a wonderful guitar solo. Throw all these things in a big melting pot, add Dream Theater's best song-writing skills and add a reprise of Far From Heaven and the result is the most awesome progressive metal song they have done in years. When I heard On The Backs of Angels I really got my hopes up, then came the snippets and when the snippet for Breaking All Illusions came, I knew it would be amazing. Well, it turned out that it is. Though not exactly my favourite (for that is coming very shortly) off of A Dramatic Turn of Events, Breaking All Illusions is a stunning piece of music and one that every Dream Theater fan should like, if not love.

24. Hollow Years
This is one of the songs that make Falling into Infinity worthwhile. Don't get me wrong, because I actually really enjoy Falling into Infinity, even though it has some of the worst pieces of shit Dream Theater ever wrote, but since a lot of people here don't, I thought I should clarify. Another quite simple song for Dream Theater standards. This song usually gets the most praise for the version on the Live at the Budokan CD/DVD, which includes the fantastic extened guitar solo John Petrucci also did when I saw DT live the first time. Though amazing, I don't think it's that much better than the actual album version, as most people seem to do. This is just a very solid (loloppositeofhollow) simple song that doesn't drag or suffer from anything really. A soothing, relaxing, but very nice piece of music.

23. Scene Nine: Finally Free
The epic closer of a very epic album. Though not exactly an 'epic' in terms of technical or progressive craziness - the song is actually quite straightforward if you break it down - this song really does close Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes From A Memory in the best possible way imaginable. Wrapping up not only the storyline in the lyrics, finally revealing what has been going on, it also wraps up the music by giving several reprises of earlier themes. Starting out slowly, the song soon gets dragged into some more heavy stuff, incorporating some very cool riffs under the narrative (the shooting part) and featuring some very simplistic solo work, the song ends where it began, but then the sludgy end riff comes in. Awesome. This soon gets drowned in other sound and eventually fades out, returning to the narrative once again, before ending in static white noise, signaling the death of the turntable. Cool stuff and a very good album closer.

22. Bridges in the Sky
Yeah, I just said Breaking All Illusions was the best progressive metal song Dream Theater has done in the past few years, but this is my favourite from the album. Don't take things too literally, because I think this would definitely qualify as progressive metal as well, but in terms of progressiveness Breaking All Illusions definitely takes the cake, while Bridges in the Sky is a great metal song. The song is based on some awesome riffs that in a way remind me of The Dark Eternal Night with amazing vocal work over them. The highlight of the song is without a doubt the AWESOME singable chorus. The biggest wow-moment and most memorable piece of the entire album in my opinion. Dream Theater outdid themselves writing a metal song. This is some very, very good modern sounding progressive metal. My favourite of the album, and with that, we say goodbye to A Dramatic Turn of Events, 8 albums worth of songs left to go.

21. Voices
Having already had the other two parts of the A Mind Beside Itself Suite, it probably wouldn't have been hard to figure out that the best of the bunch would be included as well. Voices is amazing. I would actually say it was my first encounter with progressive metal in the sense that this song has both softer and heavier parts. Although Images & Words was my first Dream Theater album, none of the songs really have as much dynamics as Voices does (well, apart from Learning to Live, but I didn't *get* that song until years later). Voices is a wonderful work, both lyrically, vocally and musically. It flows like you would expect of a song, no hindrances or interruptions and it based on lots of amazing guitar work, great keyboard work and all the rest. If Dream Theater proved that they could write songs over years of time with Images & Words, with this song they proved they could write amazing songs as a full band over a shorter period of time.

[BlobVanDam]

All great picks. Especially nice to see Hollow Years that high, just because I don't think it gets as appreciated as the others, and it's a great ballad.

[TheGreatPretender]

Another Won is pretty cool, but I think putting it at 30 is going a little two far...

The latest five are nice picks.

[Jaffa]

I'm not that huge a fan of Hollow Years myself, but it's a very nice song, one I don't listen to often enough.  I think I'll listen to it right now. 

The rest are all amazing picks. 

[FlyingBIZKIT]

5 gr8 songs

[Zydar]

Another Won is pretty cool, but I think putting it at 30 is going a little two far...

[BlackInk]

Breaking All Illusions, Finally Free and Bridges In the Sky deserves higher spots. Great songs.

[Scorpion]

All of them are on my list, except for Finally Free. Great stuff.

Oh and Zydar, damn you! I wanted to point that out...

[Elite]

Yeah, well I know that, but Dream Theater has many awesome songs. 20-25 is very high already

[Pols Voice]

Probably blasphemy among DT acolytes, but I might prefer the FII version of Hollow Years. Although good, the Budokan solo seems too long and dramatic to be in a simple song.

[iamtheeviltwin]

3 of those songs are in my top 20 and Finally Free is a bit higher than I have it, another nice batch of songs.

[senecadawg2]

Another 5 solid choices, although I may even say they all deserve to be a little higher.

[Mladen]

Breaking all illusions, Bridges in the sky and Voices are as high as they should be, well done. 

[Ħ]

Yay 4 hollow years!

[Elite]

Overude update. I was away for the weekend and didn't have the list with me, so I couldn't update even if I really wanted to. But here we go, with the next five songs. And we're losing yet another album on the way. That's 4 out, 7 to go.

20. Lifting Shadows Off A Dream
A lost gem from the Awake album. This song often gets forgotten and that's probably because it's one of the softest, most delicate things Dream Theater has ever done, especially when you consider the song was on an album I deemed their heaviest earlier in this list. Starting off as a weird song, you're not likely to know what to expect, with a bass melody, soon joined by a keyboard layer. Throughout the whole song, John Petrucci seems to be noodling around, doing whatever the hell he's doing, but if you listen more closely, his part is definitely composed and serves as an integral part in the feeling and sound of the song. James LaBrie is at the top of his game once again (Awake was his best work within Dream Theater, I don't think that needs any explanation ), but in an entirely different way than on songs like Caught in a Web. Softer than ever, his voice really adds to the atmosphere of the music. It's beautiful and it's a shame this song doesn't get mentioned more often.

19. Scene Two: I. Overture 1928 & II. Strange Deja Vu
Well, it goes without saying that these songs are one together. Remember a couple of spots back I named The Root of All Evil the best album opener in Dream Theater's catalog? Well, were it not for the short Scene One: Regression, this one would have taken the cake easily. It is actually where the album really starts and these songs are interwoven into each other in a way that makes them more than just the same scene. I don't understand why Dream Theater chose to split the tracks. I never listen to one without the other and I don't think they have ever played them separately. Anyway, I didn't really care for this song at first, leaning towards the other songs on Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes From A Memory, but it was when I started playing this song with my band that I really, really got to like it. I mean, what's not to like about it? Great riffs, some nice guitar work, nothing over the top, good vocal melodies and a hell of a way to start off a great (concept) album. In Dream Theater's discography, this is one of the things that really stands out.

18. Stream of Consciousness
If I asked myself 2-3 years ago to make a Dream Theater top 50 list, this song would most likely be in the top 5. I'm not even kidding, I absolutely love this track. I know I scared some of you into thinking Vacant would be the only track off of Train of Thought. Well, rest assured, this really is the last track off of that album. It is phenomenal and it does really need introduction. To those who pass it off as random wankery, I implore you to listen to the last two minutes of This Dying Soul, to those saying it doesn't go anyway, please listen to Honor Thy Father. Again, it's no secret I don't like Train of Thought, but this song has stood out of Dream Theater whole discography. I love the way the band lays out thematic material and expands on it, creating a wonderful masterpiece, a collage almost, of a couple of riffs, melodies and solos. I could go further in depth about why I like this so much, but since it is generally viewed as one of the lesser tracks on this album, I won't. I just really like it. So, sorry folks, that really was the last of Train of Thought.

17. Peruvian Skies
A standout track from Falling Into Infinity, undoubtedly. This song starts off as a slow moving ballad (? almost), but the lyrics tell a whole different story than you would expect. The soft verses and choruses are a big change from pretty much everything Dream Theater had done up to this point in their career. After the second chorus, the song bursts into frantic heavy metal mode though, and when it does, all hell breaks loose. After a short distorted bridge, Petrucci slams out a relatively simple guitar solo that fits perfectly and then the tempo goes up a bit and the madness begins. Riff after riff gets thrown around your ears right up to the very end. I don't get how this song isn't really as loved as it should be. This actually almost made my top 10, but after restructuring the top 50, I decided to move it down anyway. It is a great example of a progressive metal band doing something else, making a hard rocking song out of a delicate clean guitar motif. If you haven't seen this song played live, pray you get to see it the next time. It's amazing in a live setting.

16. Scene Six: Home
WOMP WOMP. How could any list be complete with this song? The beast on Scenes From A Memory and at the same time the oddball. The heaviest riff in the history of Dream Theater's heavy riffs. SHIIIIIIIINE. LAKE OF FIRE. Some of the most badass lyrics they have ever done and the most difficult guitar part on all of Scenes (the guitar solo, well it is the most difficult for me, though Fatal Tragedy's solo wasn't easy either, but that's a different discussion). Metropolis watches and thoughtfully smiles, she's taken you to her home. This is the most chaotic piece of music Dream Theater has made, at least up to this point, if you listen to their stuff chronologically. The riffs are awesome, Jordan Rudess shines, James is on fire and the whole song has been constructed in a form that's unidentifiable. It's amazing how everything flows if you consider the amount of different rhythms and riffs this song is comprised of. Her ecstasy means so much to me, even deceiving my own blood. Do I really need to say how good this song is? I don't really know what I should say. I just know it is and this writeup is pretty shitty. Tell you what, this writeup is about as chaotic as the song, only Home is very, very awesome and this piece of writing isn't. It's calling me back to my home. Peace out, everybody. WOMP WOMP.

[SeRoX]

I'm perfectly OK with the place of Home but the rest is so high, IMO. SoC would not even enter my list. Their worst instrumental. Good to see LSOAD that high.

[Nekov]

20, 19 & 16 are great songs! The other two I'm not much of a fan of. And to answer to your question, no, you don't need to say how good Home is, it speaks for itself 

[FlyingBIZKIT]

All 5 are gr8


The best part of Home: "I never thought that I could carry on with this life, but I can't resist myself, no matter how hard I try"

[BlobVanDam]

Lifting Shadows Off A Dream isn't top 50 at all for me.
Overture 1928 / Strange Deja Vu is an awesome combo, but I do not consider them one song.
Stream of Consciousness is a great choice, although it wouldn't be top 20 for me.
Similarly, Peruvian Skies is a nice choice, but wouldn't make my top 20 (but I love FII, so that's a from me).
And I've always considered Home hugely overrated. Good, but overrated. Not sure it would make my top 50.

[Mladen]

All absolutely brilliant. Especially Peruvian skies, I saw it live as well and I agree it was incredible. 

[Elite]

I'm perfectly OK with the place of Home but the rest is so high, IMO. SoC would not even enter my list. Their worst instrumental. Good to see LSOAD that high.

No, the worst instrumental would be The Dance of Eternity or Ytse Jam (can't really decide). Glad to see some LSOAD love though

[Nekov]

All absolutely brilliant. Especially Peruvian skies, I saw it live as well and I agree it was incredible. 

The version I saw live would probably be top ten (meddled with Wish you were here and some metallica song I can't recall), but the record version just doesn't seem to click for me.