Octavarium marks the end of my high level of interest in DT. I started my fandom with the release of SFAM and kept current with each album until Octavarium. I am fortunate enough to live in the NYC area, and saw them each time they visited between 2000 and 2006, which included the Live Scenes from NY show, and the Score show at Radio City. I anticipated the release of their followup to Octavarium, but was rather disappointed and only listened to Systematic Chaos a few times before shelving it. Thus, Octavarium remains, in my opinion, their last good album. After that, I haven't bought any of their subsequent releases, though I continued to listen to everything from I&W to 8VM. I've listened here and there to some songs from the post-Systematic Chaos albums, just to get an idea of what they were doing, but nothing interested me. Seemed rather lifeless.
A few weeks ago, something made me buy the LSFNY DVD (I only had it on VHS before) and I loved it as much as I remember when watching it 14 years ago. It was great to see the bonus footage too, including ACOS. I still like DT as much as ever, but everything after 2006 is unrecognizable to me. I attribute some of this to getting older, where I have come to appreciate good songs that are written simply and am less impressed with technical ability. That being said, I feel DT did a great job combining songwriting ability, emotional and thoughtful lyrics and melodies with their technical proficiency, but they have lost that somewhere after Octavarium.