Here is something controversial for you to chew on!
I was listening to "Cleaning Out the Closet" in my car yesterday.
I would love to hear Dream Theater make more songs like Don´t Look Past Me, Where Are you Know, The way it used to be, Speak To me etc.
The almost "poppy" sound and more "simpler" mainstream-radio-friendly songs sound so refreshing after listening to mostly heavier songs from DT.
I have to say that Cleaning out the closet is pretty much my top 5 DT albums (even though, not a official studio recording)
What do you guys think?
I don't think this is a controversial opinion on DTF where a lot of folks also like COTC. I've expressed my opinion about those songs many times. In short, I think none of those songs are any better than average and most are WELL below average. I have no problem with "simpler," "radio-friendly" songs. DT has plenty of those that I love, but the COTC songs didn't make it on an official release for a good reason.
Yeah, I agree that it isn't really "controversial." As you say, a lot of folks here like those songs, myself included. But putting it in a "top 5" ranked against DT's studio albums is definitely a minority opinion. That's a pretty strong take.
But I also think the opinion that they were left off the album "for a reason," and the obvious implication that they are "inferior" to all songs that made the cut is a bit too strong and assumes some things that may or may not actually be true. Getting into obviously subjective territory here, but I think this would probably be close to the consensus if you could ask a lot of people: while perhaps none of those songs feel quite as strong as the ones that have come to be "classics," a good many of them are at least as strong as the less-liked songs from the album, and a lot of people would probably feel that a number of them are right up there with the "middle-of-the-road" FII album tracks as well. I know that would hold true for me. I don't reach for those songs often. But when I do, I enjoy them. And I have to say, I enjoy most of them more than I enjoy some of the songs that made the album. The thing is, if you could throw all the songs from that era into a pot and ask 100 fans to pick whichever ones they liked best to come up with a single album, you would probably get a ton of variation. And if I had to guess, I would think that most versions would be liked about as much as the album we got, give or take a small margin. I know that for me, if I could sub out a few of the album tracks for a few of the extras that didn't make it, FII would be a "better" album, as far as I'm concerned.
At the end of the day, I think it's cool that the fans even got access to these songs. DT doesn't really have a long list of singles with b-sides. But these songs are kind of the equivalent. And seen as such, I think they easily stand up as well as any band's non-album rarities, which is to say that there are some that don't feel album quality, some that feel like they could easily have made the cut if the decision was made on a different day, and the rare gem or two that have become somewhat cult-favorites. And, again, it's pretty cool that we even have these.