Anyone else think LITS, HK and TOT are among the weakest on FII?

[TAC]

My reaction to FII as a whole at the time of release was something along the lines of.....

This was actually my reaction to the OP.

[npiazza91]

I knew this was going to be controversial, but I thought I'd have at least one person on my side.   

Oh well.  I just really love how everything flows so nice and simple in TAMP.  The chorus is incredible, same with Hollow Years.

[jammindude]

I will back you up as far as LITS goes....but the line in the sand ( ) stops there.   HK would have been better off in its original state, but holds up pretty well on its own.   TOT however, is the cornerstone masterpiece of the album.

Honestly never understood the love for LITS....it's really kindof a mess.   They should have switched it out for Raise the Knife.

[SuperTaco]

I don't think they're the weakest. Hell's Kitchen is probably in my top 25. I really like the way that song holds out on its own.

[Crow]

What on earth is going on round here atm? Why is everyone suddenly turning on the epics? Not just for DT, but other bands as well. This is a prog band forum, for crying out loud!

personally epics tread a thin line where if done wrong they're a chore to listen to and if done right amazing

also FII has no epics
none that I would count as epics anywyas

[The Presence of Frenemies]

I like how a lot of bands have six-minute songs that get described as "epics" and yet on this board, people call DT songs up to 15 minutes and go..."not really an epic, maybe a mini-epic."

Not saying it's wrong, just a funny juxtaposition.

[bosk1]

No, it's definitely wrong. 

[Dublagent66]

What on earth is going on round here atm? Why is everyone suddenly turning on the epics? Not just for DT, but other bands as well. This is a prog band forum, for crying out loud!

personally epics tread a thin line where if done wrong they're a chore to listen to and if done right amazing

also FII has no epics
none that I would count as epics anywyas

FII has more epics than DT12.  The same would be true if FII only had one epic.

[npiazza91]

I like how a lot of bands have six-minute songs that get described as "epics" and yet on this board, people call DT songs up to 15 minutes and go..."not really an epic, maybe a mini-epic."

Not saying it's wrong, just a funny juxtaposition.

I have literally never seen the word "juxtaposition" used in a message board post before.  You win the internet.

[The Presence of Frenemies]

I like how a lot of bands have six-minute songs that get described as "epics" and yet on this board, people call DT songs up to 15 minutes and go..."not really an epic, maybe a mini-epic."

Not saying it's wrong, just a funny juxtaposition.

I have literally never seen the word "juxtaposition" used in a message board post before.  You win the internet.

Had I known that was the criteria for victory, I would have worked it in long ago!

[Lucien]

An epic, by its real definition is a narrative written in poetry, now sung today by rock and prog bands (doesn't have to be these two genres. There's also this thing called "opera", and rap sometimes falls into this category.). It just has to be a story. Therefore, that means while pieces like Breaking All Illusions or Learning to Live may or may not be an epic(depending on if you think these are narrative, I don't though), pieces like Red Barchetta (Rush) and Hotel California (Eagles) definitely are. I just call long songs that aren't epics long songs.

[ThatOneGuy2112]

The definition of an "epic" is pretty open-ended, but I feel that any band's fanbase will do a fair enough job with determining which in their catalog would be considered an "epic" for them. I tend to consider an epic as a song that's far longer than most songs that any particular band has done, so it'll usually depend on the band for me (unless it's an artist that commonly has very lengthy songs, such as Godspeed You! Black Emperor, in which case, I'd still call most of their songs epics, especially when they commonly break the 20 minute mark).

[bosk1]

I agree with you that the definition of "epic" as applied to modern music is completely different than the deposition as applied to classical literature and poetry.  But why on earth would you limit it to a comparison of what the band's "normal" song lengths are?  That makes no sense.  If a song is an epic, it doesn't matter whether the band writes mostly epics or mostly "standard length" songs.  Are Duel With the Devil, All of the Above, or Stranger In Your Soul somehow not epics just because they are typical of Transatlantic's song length?  I don't think so.  That just seems strange.

[ThatOneGuy2112]

The definition of an "epic" is pretty open-ended, but I feel that any band's fanbase will do a fair enough job with determining which in their catalog would be considered an "epic" for them. I tend to consider an epic as a song that's far longer than most songs that any particular band has done, so it'll usually depend on the band for me (unless it's an artist that commonly has very lengthy songs, such as Godspeed You! Black Emperor, in which case, I'd still call most of their songs epics, especially when they commonly break the 20 minute mark).

[bosk1]

I know, but it seems like such a random criterion to even have in the first place, especially since a lot of the band that are frequently listened to and discussed on the forum are bands that consistently put out a lot of long songs to begin with.  Why have that criterion if there are going to be so many exceptions?  I don't understand why someone would do that.  It is just commonly understood that an epic is an epic regardless of how long a particular band's other songs are.

[LieLowTheWantedMan]

TOT is an amazing song. HK is pretty cool. LITS is hilarious. So 1/3.

[The Presence of Frenemies]

I know, but it seems like such a random criterion to even have in the first place, especially since a lot of the band that are frequently listened to and discussed on the forum are bands that consistently put out a lot of long songs to begin with.  Why have that criterion if there are going to be so many exceptions?  I don't understand why someone would do that.  It is just commonly understood that an epic is an epic regardless of how long a particular band's other songs are.

Exactly. Because if you put A Nightmare To Remember against a five-minute punk song, there would be no contest as to which would be more of an epic. That doesn't say anything about the quality, mind you--it just means that at least 80% of DT's discog is going to appear more epic than the vast majority of other rock/metal.

[bosk1]

^I don't disagree with any of that.  But I still don't see why you would need to put A Nightmare To Remember against anything.  Either it is an epic in its own right or it isn't.

[hefdaddy42]

It isn't.

[Crow]

goddammit i sparked a pointless argument on the internet again whoops
i guess Trial of Tears maybe qualifies as an epic with the three distinct sections and all, but Lines in the Sand is just a long song and I'm fine with that. I still think Trial of Tears doesn't really have the progression of an epic though.

other examples, Celestial Elixir (Haken) and Swim to the Moon (BTBAM) are not epics by the definition I tend to use even if they're both pretty long

[The Presence of Frenemies]

^I don't disagree with any of that.  But I still don't see why you would need to put A Nightmare To Remember against anything.  Either it is an epic in its own right or it isn't.

The point was that, if the average song had the scope of 8V or ACOS, calling ANTR (or TMOLS/ITNOG, etc) particularly epic would seem a little odd. Because "epic" is a comparative description, the same way John Petrucci talks about the DT12 tracks as "short."

For example, the title track of Trivium's Shogun is just under 12 minutes long. Given its length and structural attributes as compared to the rest of their discography, it is undeniably their "epic." In a DT context, though, it would be perceived as being about as epic as the 10-14 minute songs on Train of Thought. It's not like we hear This Dying Soul or Endless Sacrifice called "epics" all that often, though, because if we call them "epics," then the same label would apply to at least half of DT's discography. Which, to me, it does! The songs that aren't epics provide the contrast--Wither, IWBY, TLG, TSM, Anna Lee, Surrounded, Another Day, etc. etc.

None of this has anything to do with how good the songs are, in a "whoa, that song is epic!" sense. To me, it's simply a question of whether the artist sought to create a piece of music that had a considerably more expansive scope than the "standard" compositions of their genre (rock/metal in DT's case). How well that artistic vision is executed is irrelevant to the categorization of the song, much like the "SDOIT is/isn't a song" debate.

[bosk1]

I get what you are saying, but again, I have never seen anyone use "epic" as a "relative term," and that just seems strange to me.  I kind of get where you are coming from if you use "epic" as an adjective (e.g. "that song is epic" (either referring to length or quality), but it makes no sense as a noun (e.g. "that song is an epic.").  But I do note that you seem to mix the two uses together, so I am still at a bit of a loss. 

And, yes, I would consider Shogun an epic if Dream Theater wrote it.  But we could throw around examples all day of songs that are somewhat..."borderline," for lack of a better description.  As I myself have said, and as I think most would agree, there is no set criteria for what constitutes an epic, and the lines quite often are blurry.  I can't take a hard position that a song is or is not an epic, and I am not calling you (or anyone else) wrong for disagreeing with me.  Again, my only issue is just that I find it weird that you seem to refer to "epic" as relative.  But anyway, no need to go too far afield with this. 

[The Presence of Frenemies]

I get what you are saying, but again, I have never seen anyone use "epic" as a "relative term," and that just seems strange to me.  I kind of get where you are coming from if you use "epic" as an adjective (e.g. "that song is epic" (either referring to length or quality), but it makes no sense as a noun (e.g. "that song is an epic.").  But I do note that you seem to mix the two uses together, so I am still at a bit of a loss. 

And, yes, I would consider Shogun an epic if Dream Theater wrote it.  But we could throw around examples all day of songs that are somewhat..."borderline," for lack of a better description.  As I myself have said, and as I think most would agree, there is no set criteria for what constitutes an epic, and the lines quite often are blurry.  I can't take a hard position that a song is or is not an epic, and I am not calling you (or anyone else) wrong for disagreeing with me.  Again, my only issue is just that I find it weird that you seem to refer to "epic" as relative.  But anyway, no need to go too far afield with this.

Not to get too far afield either, but I do want to quickly clarify my stance here, because I actually think we agree and just are miscommunicating. What I'm saying is that the noun "an epic" actually should be a fixed term in the ideal, but it tends to get used in a relative context, which is what creates confusion, especially when it comes to a band so far out of the length/structural norms as Dream Theater.

I think that most songs over, say, nine minutes (arbitrary but reasonable cutoff, I think) are epics, unless they are strictly just a standard verse-chorus-verse-chorus-break-verse-chorus structure where the break is just aimless jamming that happens to be long, like, say, In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida or something. Occasionally, shorter songs that have particularly expansive arrangements (like TKH, for example) can fall into the category as well.

Obviously, that classification encompasses a good portion of DT's discography, and I do think that the songs that meet those criteria are epics. period. However, the term is clearly not typically used that way on this board, and I think that's because given what DT does, it wouldn't provide much distinction. Voices, Beyond This Life, In The Name of God, and Octavarium are all epics, but their scopes are very different, so lumping them all under the "epic" umbrella is a rather unhelpful characterization. So applying the term "correctly" would result in the term actually losing its meaning a fair bit; thus we tend to move the line of "epic" to the songs that are "especially epic" (TCOT+, basically). Then, you hear the term "mini-epic" thrown around to describe songs that would be "epics" by the Triviums or radio-ready rock/metal groups of the world. As such, I think that when it comes to stuff like ANTR, we tend to emphasize what isn't epic about it, just to distinguish it from the ACOS group. And thus we get different criteria for use of the word "epic" with DT songs, just to categorize more finely, when in the larger context, many of the songs we don't think of as "epics" actually do qualify, and rather easily at that.

Just my two cents.

[Calvin6s]

Isn't there an institute in Zurich that determines epics simply by using the couric as the unit of measurement?

[bosk1]

[more stuff about "epics"]

Yeah, I gotcha.  That makes sense.