I totally disagree, Reap. After a couple close listens, I think the drums on this are easily more interesting that anything Portnoy has done on any of his projects in recent years.
everyone listen to the drumming at 2:10 - 2:30
once people see him doing that live and not hearing it from a youtube mix, they will like mangini's drumming on it alot more
Likewise, those really fast one-handed cymbal hits at 3:27-ish?
Yeah, I doubt Portnoy can do that.
The drumming on this song is so good. Mangini's cymbal action, so far, is such a noticeable improvement over Portnoy's. During the chorus, like 5:25-50 for example, Mangini's playing a bunch of different cymbals and it sounds awesome. Then, after that over Jordan's clean piano solo, he's doing a high hat but he's letting it open and close and doing some other things and also hitting other cymbals, all while keeping the beat interesting with the kick patterns. Only during Petrucci's solo does he switch his cymbal playing to just playing in 4/4, which is fine because John is supposed to take the spotlight there anyway.
Going by Portnoy's performances on the last couple albums, I'd imagine he'd play the entire part I'm talking about above by simply hitting the high-hat as if it were a metronome. Sure, there would have been some tastey fills. But with Portnoy recently, it seemed he'd be doing something really basic, or he'd be doing a cool fill but the cymbal playing wouldn't be that great. Likewise, maybe the cymbal playing would be good but the beat would be nothing special. Mangini can do it all at once. I've got a feeling we're gonna notice how much of a better player he is when the new record comes out
Topic: New Album Title (A Dramatic Turn of Events) and Track Listing Revealed (Read 484559 times)