- " The Astonishing " - One Year -- er, EIGHT YEARS On.

[ReaperKK]

Or it made it a truly unique experience for those who paid their own money to see the show, and actually use their own eyes to see a band live, in the flesh, and their own memory banks to remember it.

I saw it with my own eyes three times, and bought six tickets in total. I traveled across state lines twice in order to do so, so you can stop preaching. Here's the thing. Twenty years from now, I will have no memory of that guitar solo. If I'm lucky, there will be a single recording, barely audible that does nothing for JM's bitching bass line, still floating around somewhere on the internet.

The weird thing with me is that I have a horrible memory for concerts. I went to Score and couldn't wait to see the show yet I barely remember anything from the show anymore.

[Chino]

Or it made it a truly unique experience for those who paid their own money to see the show, and actually use their own eyes to see a band live, in the flesh, and their own memory banks to remember it.

I saw it with my own eyes three times, and bought six tickets in total. I traveled across state lines twice in order to do so, so you can stop preaching. Here's the thing. Twenty years from now, I will have no memory of that guitar solo. If I'm lucky, there will be a single recording, barely audible that does nothing for JM's bitching bass line, still floating around somewhere on the internet.

The weird thing with me is that I have a horrible memory for concerts. I went to Score and couldn't wait to see the show yet I barely remember anything from the show anymore.

This. I'm thrilled I have a copy of it. The only thing I actually remember about that show were;

1) The curtain being stuck on the right side of the stage during intermission, revealing the orchestra setting up and ruing the surprise.
2) A behemoth of a security guard giving me a death stare when I went to try and touch Jordan when they were waving goodnight to the crowd.

[Kotowboy]

I actually had every intention of buying The Astonishing on Vinyl but it's like 4 discs and £70.

Far too much. I actually just bought a triple Vinyl album for £25 just to give you an idea how much more The Astonishing is.

[skipreid]

I hated it the from the first time I listened to it. I tried to listen to it 2 more times over the year. I cannot stand that album. It is horrible. I would rank it last. I am happy for those of you who really love it though. That means you haven't had a DT void in your life over the last year like I have.

[Architeuthis]

I hated it the from the first time I listened to it. I tried to listen to it 2 more times over the year. I cannot stand that album. It is horrible. I would rank it last. I am happy for those of you who really love it though. That means you haven't had a DT void in your life over the last year like I have.

Is there any songs on it you like?  There are some songs on there that sound like DT staples, Moment Of Betrayal being one of them.

[gzarruk]

I hated it the from the first time I listened to it. I tried to listen to it 2 more times over the year. I cannot stand that album. It is horrible. I would rank it last. I am happy for those of you who really love it though. That means you haven't had a DT void in your life over the last year like I have.

Is there any songs on it you like?  There are some songs on there that sound like DT staples, Moment Of Betrayal being one of them.

The whole song is amazing to me, but THAT instrumental section and THAT drum solo at the end... perfection.

[rumborak]

Moments of Betrayal has a bit of the same problem Repentance has, where the section they"put on repeat" at the end is just not strong enough to carry the song. MM tries to break the monotony somewhat, but his meter changes are kinda unmusical, IMO. There's probably some cool pattern he does, but to me it sounds random.

[Adami]

I hated it the from the first time I listened to it. I tried to listen to it 2 more times over the year. I cannot stand that album. It is horrible. I would rank it last. I am happy for those of you who really love it though. That means you haven't had a DT void in your life over the last year like I have.

Is there any songs on it you like?  There are some songs on there that sound like DT staples, Moment Of Betrayal being one of them.

The whole song is amazing to me, but THAT instrumental section and THAT drum solo at the end... perfection.

Drum solo?

[ReaperKK]

Or it made it a truly unique experience for those who paid their own money to see the show, and actually use their own eyes to see a band live, in the flesh, and their own memory banks to remember it.

I saw it with my own eyes three times, and bought six tickets in total. I traveled across state lines twice in order to do so, so you can stop preaching. Here's the thing. Twenty years from now, I will have no memory of that guitar solo. If I'm lucky, there will be a single recording, barely audible that does nothing for JM's bitching bass line, still floating around somewhere on the internet.

The weird thing with me is that I have a horrible memory for concerts. I went to Score and couldn't wait to see the show yet I barely remember anything from the show anymore.

This. I'm thrilled I have a copy of it. The only thing I actually remember about that show were;

1) The curtain being stuck on the right side of the stage during intermission, revealing the orchestra setting up and ruing the surprise.
2) A behemoth of a security guard giving me a death stare when I went to try and touch Jordan when they were waving goodnight to the crowd.

3.) JP's guitar cutting out during UAGM

[rumborak]

I remember some scantily clad jail bait in the row before me.

[SystematicThought]

Moments of Betrayal has a bit of the same problem Repentance has, where the section they"put on repeat" at the end is just not strong enough to carry the song. MM tries to break the monotony somewhat, but his meter changes are kinda unmusical, IMO. There's probably some cool pattern he does, but to me it sounds random.

One of my favorite parts of the whole song is the double kick that Mangini does at the end of it

[Herrick]

I remember some scantily clad jail bait in the row before me.

Male or female?

[Cyclopssss]

I kind of see the point about not having ANY recording of the concerts. I can't imagine why they couldn't release a good audio recording of them.

[SwedishGoose]

I kind of see the point about not having ANY recording of the concerts. I can't imagine why they couldn't release a good audio recording of them.

On a BlueRay accompanied with the tour visuals... I would buy that

[JLa]

It's been a year already? Wow.

I must confess I still haven't properly "listened" to it. I bought it on release, played it a few times, was completely underwhelmed and put it in the shelf. Since then I have played the occasional track on Spotify, but I just can't get into it. The story does nothing for me and it's way too mellow for my taste. I use to like DT's ballad-y stuff, but this album was too much.

[Dream Team]

I still don't get this. Yes there are like 9 ballads, but also about 20 rocking or heavy songs, twice as many as a normal DT record.

[MirrorMask]

Well, let's play a game: take Along for the Ride out of DT12, and take a slowish song from The Astonishing, to eventually change the lyrics for, to place it on DT12 instead replacing Along for the Ride as the "ballad" of the album. How many songs off The Astonishing can be used for this? I can count no more than 5 or 6.

[RodrigoAltaf]

There´s ZERO grit on the so called heavy songs of The Astonishing.

[MHStrawn]

At first I was hopeful....sounded good in some places but droned on in quite a few others. 

After about 15 listens I had come to the conclusion it was the worst DT album in their catalog.  Zero five star songs; a few 4 star-songs, 10 or so 3-star songs and the rest not worth listening to.  I left the 3-4 star songs in rotation...but found myself skipping them everytime they came up. 

My overall rating for the album is 51.....without question the worst DT album in their history. 

[red barchetta]

There´s ZERO grit on the so called heavy songs of The Astonishing.

Totally

[red barchetta]

I still don't get this. Yes there are like 9 ballads, but also about 20 rocking or heavy songs, twice as many as a normal DT record.

Really? I must have a hearing problem

[Dream Team]

I still don't get this. Yes there are like 9 ballads, but also about 20 rocking or heavy songs, twice as many as a normal DT record.

Really? I must have a hearing problem

Quite obviously. Are you thinking about getting that checked?

[Dream Team]

There´s ZERO grit on the so called heavy songs of The Astonishing.

Bull. MoB and TWS have plenty of grit, to name just 2.

[mikeyd23]

There´s ZERO grit on the so called heavy songs of The Astonishing.

What DT songs (outside of TA) do you think have "grit"?

[bosk1]

There´s ZERO grit on the so called heavy songs of The Astonishing.

I'm not even really sure what this means.

[goo-goo]

There´s ZERO grit on the so called heavy songs of The Astonishing.

I'm not even really sure what this means.

[bosk1]

And I'm even less sure what that post means.

[rumborak]

This is so stunningly awful, I couldn't not share it

[goo-goo]

And I'm even less sure what that post means.

Grit...potato grit!!

[Evai]

James sings with way too much grit nowadays in my opinion (did Wait For Sleep REALLY need it??), don't encourage it!

[Chino]

There´s ZERO grit on the so called heavy songs of The Astonishing.

[Herrick]

I still don't get this. Yes there are like 9 ballads, but also about 20 rocking or heavy songs, twice as many as a normal DT record.

There are a lot of slow moments. They're not all necessarily ballads but they're not rocking either.

[Kotowboy]

There´s ZERO grit on the so called heavy songs of The Astonishing.

I'm not even really sure what this means.

Songs
Of
Unsatisfactory
Performances

?

[Samsara]

Giving TA its first front-to-back listen since the first few months of its release. We'll see how it goes...

[Siddhartha]

I prefer the album to DT12 and that´s the best thing I could say of it.

Well, there´s a couple of moments that I really really like (When your Time Has Come, The Gift of Music), but overall it doesn´t work for me.

And I´m a big Disney fan.