DT13 Plans?

[rumborak]

I will say this though, if a slight pause in the cycle facilitates both a new LMR and maybe (dare I even mention it?) JP's second solo album, I'm totally down with that. In fact, I'd be much more interested in those than in a new DT album anyway.

[Lucien]

I think Dream Theater actually had a hard time crafting the self-titled because they find it harder to write short songs that still retain their signature sound.

I don't get why they need to have a "signature sound". Just play what comes to you, don't throw it away because it's not "prog metal". This is one of the reasons I feel Jordan is underutilized. He's a great musician, he's great as making awesome music, but if you go to his youtube channel, you'll find a ton of that music is piano improvisation. Pretty quiet stuff. Never to be used on a DT album, which is sad.

[Mosh]

I think in retrospect DT's career will look a lot like Rush's. Great run of albums at the beginning before peaking, then a string of albums that are consistently mostly good, but nothing coming even close to their glory days. Which isn't a bad thing at all, not many bands can keep even that level of consistency for their entire careers. Hopefully DT will surprise us with at least one more top tier album they way Rush did with Clockwork Angels.

[hefdaddy42]

I think Dream Theater actually had a hard time crafting the self-titled because they find it harder to write short songs that still retain their signature sound.

I don't get why they need to have a "signature sound".

Because this is their job, there is a marketplace, and this is their product.  They can't alienate the target audience too much.

[Podaar]

I think Dream Theater actually had a hard time crafting the self-titled because they find it harder to write short songs that still retain their signature sound.

I don't get why they need to have a "signature sound".

Because this is their job, there is a marketplace, and this is their product.  They can't alienate the target audience too much.

Not to mention that they really, really enjoy their signature sound! I still can't believe that some fans don't realize that bands write and play music they like. No band writes music you happen to not like in an attempt to piss you off...they actually think you might enjoy it too. 

[TheOutlawXanadu]

Not to mention that they really, really enjoy their signature sound! I still can't believe that some fans don't realize that bands write and play music they like. No band writes music you happen to not like in an attempt to piss you off...they actually think you might enjoy it too. 

I think you hit the nail on the head here, sir. At the end of the day, Dream Theater will continue their current write-record-tour cycle because they love doing it. Personally, I actually think it's pretty cool. There are bands like Opeth who are totally unpredictable, and I dig that, but it's also nice to know what you're getting once in a while.

[Kotowboy]

I think Dream Theater actually had a hard time crafting the self-titled because they find it harder to write short songs that still retain their signature sound.

I don't get why they need to have a "signature sound".

Because this is their job, there is a marketplace, and this is their product.  They can't alienate the target audience too much.

Quite. The last thing I want DT to do is " do a Radiohead".




... No i don't want them to do it even then.

[mikeyd23]

Not to mention that they really, really enjoy their signature sound! I still can't believe that some fans don't realize that bands write and play music they like. No band writes music you happen to not like in an attempt to piss you off...they actually think you might enjoy it too. 

This. Sure they might stretch things a little in one direction or another, but at the end of the day, they are going to create music they love. That music will probably sound somewhat similar to what they have created before, because they have always created music they love. I guess you could call that a signature sound.

[erwinrafael]

I think in retrospect DT's career will look a lot like Rush's. Great run of albums at the beginning before peaking, then a string of albums that are consistently mostly good, but nothing coming even close to their glory days. Which isn't a bad thing at all, not many bands can keep even that level of consistency for their entire careers. Hopefully DT will surprise us with at least one more top tier album they way Rush did with Clockwork Angels.

But this again would just boil down to a matter of taste because I personally find Dream Theater and A Dramatic Turn of Events as some of their best material (and I am sure there are a lot of quiet members here who have the same opinion).

Personally, unlike a lot of the vocal fans in this forum, I have long moved on from the phase where Images and Words along with Scense from a Memory was like some unreachable peak and everything else DT has put out was just second rate.While Awake remains as my favorite DT album, I have appreciated the evolution of their sound. I believe that they took a turn not to my liking in Systematic Chaos and Black Clouds and Silver Linings, but they have righted the ship by emphasizing melodies again in their songs over heavy riffage.

Behind The Veil is a shorter song and it's perfectly written.  Too bad most of the other shorter songs weren't as good.  I think they had problems writing the long closer and like I said before, if they had put in more time and effort, it might have lived up to the caliber of their other long epics.  It doesn't even come close.

Again, a matter of taste. A lot of members of this forum actually like Illumination Theory if you go to the IT and epic threads, and I find that those who don't like it just refuse to acknowledge that there is a structure underlying the song. The only DT long epic that has a similarly well-thought out structure is Octavarium and SDOIT. It's one thing to just say that you don't like the song as a matter of taste, it's another thing to imply that the song was not meticulously composed and given a lot of thought by the band just because you do not appreciate or understand it.

I don't get why they need to have a "signature sound". Just play what comes to you, don't throw it away because it's not "prog metal". This is one of the reasons I feel Jordan is underutilized. He's a great musician, he's great as making awesome music, but if you go to his youtube channel, you'll find a ton of that music is piano improvisation. Pretty quiet stuff. Never to be used on a DT album, which is sad.

And now we can see a conflict of the vocal commenters in this forum when it comes to the self-titled. Some, like Dublagent66, like Behind the Veil, the most DT-sounding of all the songs in that album. Then we have some like Lucien who question why there needs to be a signature sound. Ano ba talaga gusto niyo?

I have joked in another thread that DT albums go through five album cycles.  It was a joke, but I think there is also some truth to it, because we do operate and think in some sort of rhythm. The Dream Theater album was in the stage in the cycle where they established their signature sound (the equivalent would be Images and Words in the first cycle and Train of Thought in the second cycle). The next album (my bold prediction LOL) would then be the album where DT would try to incorporate influences from the contemporary music scence, just like Awake in the first cycle (which incorporated the angst of the grunge scene) and Octavarium in the second cycle (which incorporated the Muse elements). Maybe we'll hear more electronic and atmospheric stuff? We'll see.

[Mosh]

I think in retrospect DT's career will look a lot like Rush's. Great run of albums at the beginning before peaking, then a string of albums that are consistently mostly good, but nothing coming even close to their glory days. Which isn't a bad thing at all, not many bands can keep even that level of consistency for their entire careers. Hopefully DT will surprise us with at least one more top tier album they way Rush did with Clockwork Angels.

But this again would just boil down to a matter of taste because I personally find Dream Theater and A Dramatic Turn of Events as some of their best material (and I am sure there are a lot of quiet members here who have the same opinion).

Sure, but generally speaking the most universally loved DT albums are the early ones. Of course you'll get fans who like the later stuff and think it's just as good, if not better. But for the most part people consider the run from I&W to Six Degrees as DT's golden age. Same with Rush, while the most popular albums tend to be from 2112 to Moving Pictures, you get plenty of exceptions to the rule.

[erwinrafael]

I think in retrospect DT's career will look a lot like Rush's. Great run of albums at the beginning before peaking, then a string of albums that are consistently mostly good, but nothing coming even close to their glory days. Which isn't a bad thing at all, not many bands can keep even that level of consistency for their entire careers. Hopefully DT will surprise us with at least one more top tier album they way Rush did with Clockwork Angels.

But this again would just boil down to a matter of taste because I personally find Dream Theater and A Dramatic Turn of Events as some of their best material (and I am sure there are a lot of quiet members here who have the same opinion).

Sure, but generally speaking the most universally loved DT albums are the early ones. Of course you'll get fans who like the later stuff and think it's just as good, if not better. But for the most part people consider the run from I&W to Six Degrees as DT's golden age. Same with Rush, while the most popular albums tend to be from 2112 to Moving Pictures, you get plenty of exceptions to the rule.

But this is the normal trend for all popular musicians right? Fans thinking that the first half of the band's discography is better than the second half (a lot of this has to do with nostalgia factor of the glory days that have passed, back in the days when music was still good). The only band that i can think of that bucked this trend is The Beatles, and I am pretty sure that back in the 1960s, a lot of fans who were sucked in during their pop phase held the second half of their discography in contempt (or in disbelief).

[Lucien]

I think Dream Theater actually had a hard time crafting the self-titled because they find it harder to write short songs that still retain their signature sound.

I don't get why they need to have a "signature sound".

Because this is their job, there is a marketplace, and this is their product.  They can't alienate the target audience too much.

Something about that just feels wrong to me. "We can't do too many different things on one album because people might not like the album, and therefore might not buy it." I don't know. I just feel like a band like Dream Theater should be more diverse in output. It's progressive rock/metal, after all, which isn't  quite as thin a genre as some make it out to be.

[erwinrafael]

I think Dream Theater actually had a hard time crafting the self-titled because they find it harder to write short songs that still retain their signature sound.

I don't get why they need to have a "signature sound".

Because this is their job, there is a marketplace, and this is their product.  They can't alienate the target audience too much.

Something about that just feels wrong to me. "We can't do too many different things on one album because people might not like the album, and therefore might not buy it." I don't know. I just feel like a band like Dream Theater should be more diverse in output. It's progressive rock/metal, after all, which isn't  quite as thin a genre as some make it out to be.

The band's sound is already diverse in output. Just play BC&SL, ADTOE and DT back to back and you would hear a wide range of musical styles just from these last three albums.

[Rodni Demental]

But this is the normal trend for all popular musicians right? Fans thinking that the first half of the band's discography is better than the second half (a lot of this has to do with nostalgia factor of the glory days that have passed, back in the days when music was still good). The only band that i can think of that bucked this trend is The Beatles, and I am pretty sure that back in the 1960s, a lot of fans who were sucked in during their pop phase held the second half of their discography in contempt (or in disbelief).

The Beatles kind of had a pretty short lived career really, at least as far as output goes. Although they did have about 12 studio albums over 7 years (not counting any of the singles or duplicate American or British versions). which is almost 2 albums a year when you put it in perspective. They were very busy. But pretty much, we didn't get to see what would have happened in the 'later years' because their time was so condensed that even their more "experimental", "mature" years were still only a few years apart from their "early days".

And yeah, it practically happens every time, a bands early years are considered their golden age. I'd guess that a lot of The Beatles 'original' fans of that sort of 50s pop/rock at the time, would have really turned their heads at Sgt Peppers/Abbey Road/White Album etc. Of course in retrospect, that was some of their most influential stuff.

[Lucien]

The band's sound is already diverse in output. Just play BC&SL, ADTOE and DT back to back and you would hear a wide range of musical styles just from these last three albums.

Yes, you've got the really metal stuff (ANTR/TSF, BMUBMD, TEI), ballads (Wither, TITL/FFH/BTS, AFTR), single-sounding (AROP, OTBOA, BTV/TEI), epics with noodly shtuff (ANTR/TCOT/TSF, LNF/BITS/Outcry/BAI, IT), and the power ballad sort of songs (TITL, STR/TBP).

5 categories. Not very specific, I guess, but you could stick nearly every song in their discography into one of those categories. There is a lot of similarity between songs all the way in the beginning to now, stylistically. There have been a few awesome moments of stylistic difference (8VM intro, SDV, SDOIT Overture, IT string section/easter egg, TOWHTSTS intro, TCOT ambient section, etc. etc.), but there aren't that many. I don't know. I just feel like they haven't tried enough, being a progressive band. They seem to cater to the people who like things in those 5 song categories.

[erwinrafael]

Well, they are progressive in the sense that most of their music are of the prog-metal genre that is characterized by odd time signatures, several transitions in styles within songs, unusual song structures, an epic sound and a lot of display of technical virtuosity. They are not experimental, if that is what you are trying to put into the progressive label.

That being said, I think they have a lot of moments where they pushed boundaries. You only mention a lot of the atmospheric stuff, but they also have these moments of experimentation like the guitar solo in Misunderstood, the crazy free-flowing instrumental in Surrender to Reason, etc.

Anyway, if we dissect the Dream Theater album, you have 1) an orchestra-mimicking instrumental intro, 2) a heavy-riffing energetic metal opener, 3) a Rush tribute, 4) an instrumental that sounds like the guys are having a fun jamming session, 5) a "cinematic" ballad, 6) a fast song with a signature DT combination of fast and slow parts, 7) a short song that's along the lines of BAI in feel (very John Myung), 8) a soft ballad, 9) a 19-minute + epic with nine movements, and 10) an atmospheric slow outro. That sounds pretty diverse to me, in just one album.

[marlencrabapple]

I think Dream Theater actually had a hard time crafting the self-titled because they find it harder to write short songs that still retain their signature sound.

I don't get why they need to have a "signature sound".

Because this is their job, there is a marketplace, and this is their product.  They can't alienate the target audience too much.

Quite. The last thing I want DT to do is " do a Radiohead".




... No i don't want them to do it even then.

If  "doing a Radiohead" gets us Dream Theater's equivalent of Kid A I'm all for it.

[Rodni Demental]

Well, they are progressive in the sense that most of their music are of the prog-metal genre that is characterized by odd time signatures, several transitions in styles within songs, unusual song structures, an epic sound and a lot of display of technical virtuosity. They are not experimental, if that is what you are trying to put into the progressive label.

Completely agree. There's still plenty of room to play around within those boundaries though, and they have certainly pushed these boundaries before. But "experimental" stuff, despite being something people apparently want to see, is a very dangerous thing for a band to do once they're well established. I like the idea of being "experimental" with new fresh ideas as much as the next guy, but it really could mean anything. I think what people really mean by experimental, is they want something different, something that just might hopefully match up with a style they might prefer. OR they want to be surprised by something they didn't expect, but not be offput. And I think we could all agree that there'd be some things we kinda don't want them to experiment with.

[Calvin6s]

And I think we could all agree that there'd be some things we kinda don't want them to experiment with.

What don't we want them experimenting with?

[Rodni Demental]

Okay, you called me out and you got me there.  I guess I like to think I'd be open to the band "experimenting" with whatever they're excited about musically which should be good enough for me. I just sorta meant we all probably have personal disinclinations that we would disfavor, such is the ambiguity of experimentation.

[Prog Snob]

And I think we could all agree that there'd be some things we kinda don't want them to experiment with.

What don't we want them experimenting with?

Anything MP thought was a good idea?  *cough* Muse *cough*

[Mosh]

Man the MP bashing is getting old. It's been 4 years, let it go.

[Prog Snob]

Man the MP bashing is getting old. It's been 4 years, let it go.

Not a bash.  If it was a bash of him, you would know.   

[Calvin6s]

What don't we want them experimenting with?

Anything MP thought was a good idea?  *cough* Muse *cough*

Really?  I wish they did more of stuff like that.

The only things I can recall that I absolutely did not like as DT's experiment was the LaBrie rap.

You could also point to Petrucci's acceptance of going more commercial / outside writers on FII.  However, I think that might have had short term problems, long term benefits.

[Prog Snob]

What don't we want them experimenting with?

Anything MP thought was a good idea?  *cough* Muse *cough*

Really?  I wish they did more of stuff like that.

The only things I can recall that I absolutely did not like as DT's experiment was the LaBrie rap.

You could also point to Petrucci's acceptance of going more commercial / outside writers on FII.  However, I think that might have had short term problems, long term benefits.

I have a strong dislike for Never Enough so, no, I did not particularly like that venture of theirs.

[Rodni Demental]

I have a strong dislike for Never Enough so, no, I did not particularly like that venture of theirs.

And then complain
That you didn't like the way
I put the knife in wrong

Sorry... sorry... I literally could not not go there. 

[Calvin6s]

What don't we want them experimenting with?

Anything MP thought was a good idea?  *cough* Muse *cough*

Really?  I wish they did more of stuff like that.

I have a strong dislike for Never Enough so, no, I did not particularly like that venture of theirs.

My mind was thinking more of Prophets of War.

[hefdaddy42]

Yeah, I wish they'd never do anything like that again, also.

[Another_Won]

Well, last time we already knew they were going into the studio by now.

https://www.dreamtheaterforums.org/boards/index.php?topic=35260.0

. . . a day late . . . panic . . . oh no! JK 

[rumborak]

The way it sounded from MM's interview a while ago, he was pretty exhausted from the touring. Wouldn't be surprised if they took a longer break.

[emtee]

They have never really written a bad song so whatever they create I'm sure I will like. I only ask for one thing and that is to make
sure we get a sonically superior album. Please!

I do think they have tied themselves to the epic and a break from long songs would be enjoyable. Nothing over 6 minutes. But that
is asking DT not to be DT so it isn't really fair of me.

[goo-goo]

They have never really written a bad song so whatever they create I'm sure I will like. I only ask for one thing and that is to make
sure we get a sonically superior album. Please!

I do think they have tied themselves to the epic and a break from long songs would be enjoyable. Nothing over 6 minutes. But that
is asking DT not to be DT so it isn't really fair of me.

I would like no epics...just songs with lengths like in Awake or ADTOE.

[bosk1]

But this again would just boil down to a matter of taste because I personally find Dream Theater and A Dramatic Turn of Events as some of their best material (and I am sure there are a lot of quiet members here who have the same opinion).

Personally, unlike a lot of the vocal fans in this forum, I have long moved on from the phase where Images and Words along with Scense from a Memory was like some unreachable peak and everything else DT has put out was just second rate. While Awake remains as my favorite DT album, I have appreciated the evolution of their sound.

That is about where I am as well.  I am one of the "old-timers" who got onboard back when I&W was released.  To me, the I&W - Six Degrees period will always be their "classic" era and will hold a special place.  And SFAM and Six Degrees are still my two favorite albums to this day.  But that said, I LOVE the direction they are going now.  The last two albums are easily the two most consistent albums they have done, even if some of the "highs" may not quite reach the highs of some of the earlier albums.  I think I would probably put the most recent albums at #3 and #4 in the discography.  Both albums exceeded expectations.

A lot of members of this forum actually like Illumination Theory if you go to the IT and epic threads, and I find that those who don't like it just refuse to acknowledge that there is a structure underlying the song. The only DT long epic that has a similarly well-thought out structure is Octavarium and SDOIT. It's one thing to just say that you don't like the song as a matter of taste, it's another thing to imply that the song was not meticulously composed and given a lot of thought by the band just because you do not appreciate or understand it.

Of the "mega-epics" (I include ACOS, Six Degrees, Octavarium, ITPOE, TCOT, and IT in this group), IT is probably my least favorite (toss-up between TCOT and IT).  But that is completely a personal preference.  I recognize that the song is indeed, as you pointed out, meticulously crafted, and I get why they did certain things that they did, and I think the overall concept is a really cool idea.  I just don't personally connect with how they did certain things as much as I do with the other longer songs.  As you say, it is completely a preference thing.

[Rodni Demental]

I think IT is my favourite of the 6 aforementioned 'epics'. It definitely hit me harder than Octavarium which took a lot longer to grow. But then maybe IT will loose interest faster than the others, I dunno. I think it's a standout piece though and absolutely worthy of being part of this group of songs, not just by default but the quality is just as high imo, if not their best yet.

[Kotowboy]

Illumination Theory isn't in the same league as Octavarium.

I feel like every Epic they've done since then has been trying to live up to it but failed.