The two must underrated albums I've ever known: SC and BC&SL.

[Nel]

Systematic Chaos got me into the band. I like that album. It's just that afterward, I discovered a majority of their music was better than that album.

Black Clouds was great for the first few months. But by that time I had heard the rest of DT's catalogue, and the album just came off as generic by DT's standards. There are good moments for sure, but they don't really reach the highs of previous albums for me. I still listen to The Count Of Tuscany though, even with its hilarious lyrics. I just can't get back into the other five songs.

[hefdaddy42]

I hate when people don't think the way that I do.

[Jamesman42]

I hate when people don't think the way that I do.

Father! They are but mortal men! Spare their lives and have mercy on their souls!

[Super Dude]

Oh, I forgot to mention that the only SC song I like is Constant Motion. I dunno if that makes me a black sheep or something, but take that as you will.

[Tumdace]

Systematic Chaos minus Prophets of Fail is an enjoyable listen.

The Shattered Fortress and The Count Of Tuscany are the only songs I care to listen to from Black Clouds.

The middle of ANTR is pretty kick ass too.

[hefdaddy42]

Oh, I forgot to mention that the only SC song I like is Constant Motion. I dunno if that makes me a black sheep or something, but take that as you will.

People have all kinds of opinions, but that one is really weird.

[KevShmev]

Oh, I forgot to mention that the only SC song I like is Constant Motion. I dunno if that makes me a black sheep or something, but take that as you will.

People have all kinds of opinions, but that one is really weird.

Hehe, that is what I was thinking.  It's like saying, "Falling into Infinity stinks, but You Not Me is great!"

[bss4life15]

SC is my number 3 DT album, everything except POW is really good. 
BC&SL is number 9, the only songs I still listen to off of it are TBOT and TCOT.

[krands85]

It would be pretty boring if we all liked and hated the same things I suppose
 
Neither of them have ever been close to my favourite DT albums, though I probably enjoy SC more than a lot of people. I was disappointed with BC&SL from the beginning and it's in my bottom 2 or 3 DT albums. I still enjoying listening to both albums though.

Each of them has 1 song I don't really like - Repentance and The Best of Times. But they both also have 2 songs I love - ITPOE (counting it as one song) & TMOLS from Systematic Chaos and ANTR & TCOT from Black Clouds. ITPOE and TCOT are both top 10 songs for me, TMOLS and ANTR top 15/20. So the albums are quite similar for me in that way. I enjoy SC more though because I prefer ITPOE to TCOT and also TMOLS to ANTR.

The lack of songs is a problem for me on Black Clouds too. I might have preferred it to SC had they trimmed some of the fat off a few of the songs and added a good 7th track to the album.

Overall, consistency is lacking from both albums I think. Some great stuff, but too much poor/mediocre material for me (by their high standards). Thankfully it's something they've remedied spectaculary with ADTOE 
 
Damn this post is going to be a nightmare to read. Anagrams galore 

[Metabog]

SC is ok, and I remember liking it when it came out. BCSL on the other hand basically doesn't exist for me. I'd have trouble mentioning a song off that album I'd be excited to listen to.

[WildeSilas]

The epic Suck that is TMoLS not only sucked so badly that it dragged SC into the cesspool of worst DT album ever, it also retroactively pulled Octavarium in the "meh" catagory, and cast a pre-emptive shadow of Suck over BCSL. In fact, the song was so bad, it tainted every other single song released by any band, anywhere, during the month it was released, as well as drastically decreased the property value of the studio building in which is was written and recorded. I've taken thousands of showers since last listening to it, and I still can't get the Suck off. I had to replace the CD player in my car, and it leaked suck all over the other songs on my .mp3 player, which also had to be disposed of in a toxic waste receptacle. TMoLS is the primary reason SC sucked, and the reason the rest of the SC tracks cannot be objectively evaluated apart from the residual Suck of that single track.

The only thing that rivals my passion for DT is my absolute revulsion of this worst, by the numbers, phoned in, bored to tears track. It is IMO the perfect snapshot of everything that was wrong with the band in the mid 00's. I fucking hate that song, and I hate it so much it makes me hate the whole album. Plus the lyrics to most of the songs are just plain silly. It was like they turned into some teen-age Norwegian death metal band writing about fantasy monsters and ghosts, and TMoLS is the ultimate example of this misguided and ridiculous image the band tried to develop when they signed to Roadrunner. Guys in their 40's singing about mummies and comic books. Really? It was embarrassing and transparent, DT trying to be something they weren't.

I fucking hate that song and everything it represents in DT history. By the time it reached the first chorus, I knew the train and the tracks were going in two different directions.

[Jamariquay]

The epic Suck that is TMoLS not only sucked so badly that it dragged SC into the cesspool of worst DT album ever, it also retroactively pulled Octavarium in the "meh" catagory, and cast a pre-emptive shadow of Suck over BCSL. In fact, the song was so bad, it tainted every other single song released by any band, anywhere, during the month it was released, as well as drastically decreased the property value of the studio building in which is was written and recorded. I've taken thousands of showers since last listening to it, and I still can't get the Suck off. I had to replace the CD player in my car, and it leaked suck all over the other songs on my .mp3 player, which also had to be disposed of in a toxic waste receptacle. TMoLS is the primary reason SC sucked, and the reason the rest of the SC tracks cannot be objectively evaluated apart from the residual Suck of that single track.

The only thing that rivals my passion for DT is my absolute revulsion of this worst, by the numbers, phoned in, bored to tears track. It is IMO the perfect snapshot of everything that was wrong with the band in the mid 00's. I fucking hate that song, and I hate it so much it makes me hate the whole album. Plus the lyrics to most of the songs are just plain silly. It was like they turned into some teen-age Norwegian death metal band writing about fantasy monsters and ghosts, and TMoLS is the ultimate example of this misguided and ridiculous image the band tried to develop when they signed to Roadrunner. Guys in their 40's singing about mummies and comic books. Really? It was embarrassing and transparent, DT trying to be something they weren't.

I fucking hate that song and everything it represents in DT history. By the time it reached the first chorus, I knew the train and the tracks were going in two different directions.

But how do you feel about it?

[Jaffa]

The epic Suck that is TMoLS not only sucked so badly that it dragged SC into the cesspool of worst DT album ever, it also retroactively pulled Octavarium in the "meh" catagory, and cast a pre-emptive shadow of Suck over BCSL. In fact, the song was so bad, it tainted every other single song released by any band, anywhere, during the month it was released, as well as drastically decreased the property value of the studio building in which is was written and recorded. I've taken thousands of showers since last listening to it, and I still can't get the Suck off. I had to replace the CD player in my car, and it leaked suck all over the other songs on my .mp3 player, which also had to be disposed of in a toxic waste receptacle. TMoLS is the primary reason SC sucked, and the reason the rest of the SC tracks cannot be objectively evaluated apart from the residual Suck of that single track.

Even though you're kinda stepping on the toes of the point I tried to make earlier in this thread,  .

[Jamesman42]

The epic Suck that is TMoLS not only sucked so badly that it dragged SC into the cesspool of worst DT album ever, it also retroactively pulled Octavarium in the "meh" catagory, and cast a pre-emptive shadow of Suck over BCSL. In fact, the song was so bad, it tainted every other single song released by any band, anywhere, during the month it was released, as well as drastically decreased the property value of the studio building in which is was written and recorded. I've taken thousands of showers since last listening to it, and I still can't get the Suck off. I had to replace the CD player in my car, and it leaked suck all over the other songs on my .mp3 player, which also had to be disposed of in a toxic waste receptacle. TMoLS is the primary reason SC sucked, and the reason the rest of the SC tracks cannot be objectively evaluated apart from the residual Suck of that single track.

The only thing that rivals my passion for DT is my absolute revulsion of this worst, by the numbers, phoned in, bored to tears track. It is IMO the perfect snapshot of everything that was wrong with the band in the mid 00's. I fucking hate that song, and I hate it so much it makes me hate the whole album. Plus the lyrics to most of the songs are just plain silly. It was like they turned into some teen-age Norwegian death metal band writing about fantasy monsters and ghosts, and TMoLS is the ultimate example of this misguided and ridiculous image the band tried to develop when they signed to Roadrunner. Guys in their 40's singing about mummies and comic books. Really? It was embarrassing and transparent, DT trying to be something they weren't.

I fucking hate that song and everything it represents in DT history. By the time it reached the first chorus, I knew the train and the tracks were going in two different directions.

POTY

[DarkLord_Lalinc]

The epic Suck that is TMoLS not only sucked so badly that it dragged SC into the cesspool of worst DT album ever, it also retroactively pulled Octavarium in the "meh" catagory, and cast a pre-emptive shadow of Suck over BCSL. In fact, the song was so bad, it tainted every other single song released by any band, anywhere, during the month it was released, as well as drastically decreased the property value of the studio building in which is was written and recorded. I've taken thousands of showers since last listening to it, and I still can't get the Suck off. I had to replace the CD player in my car, and it leaked suck all over the other songs on my .mp3 player, which also had to be disposed of in a toxic waste receptacle. TMoLS is the primary reason SC sucked, and the reason the rest of the SC tracks cannot be objectively evaluated apart from the residual Suck of that single track.

The only thing that rivals my passion for DT is my absolute revulsion of this worst, by the numbers, phoned in, bored to tears track. It is IMO the perfect snapshot of everything that was wrong with the band in the mid 00's. I fucking hate that song, and I hate it so much it makes me hate the whole album. Plus the lyrics to most of the songs are just plain silly. It was like they turned into some teen-age Norwegian death metal band writing about fantasy monsters and ghosts, and TMoLS is the ultimate example of this misguided and ridiculous image the band tried to develop when they signed to Roadrunner. Guys in their 40's singing about mummies and comic books. Really? It was embarrassing and transparent, DT trying to be something they weren't.

I fucking hate that song and everything it represents in DT history. By the time it reached the first chorus, I knew the train and the tracks were going in two different directions.

Yes.

[LieLowTheWantedMan]

The epic Suck that is TMoLS not only sucked so badly that it dragged SC into the cesspool of worst DT album ever, it also retroactively pulled Octavarium in the "meh" catagory, and cast a pre-emptive shadow of Suck over BCSL. In fact, the song was so bad, it tainted every other single song released by any band, anywhere, during the month it was released, as well as drastically decreased the property value of the studio building in which is was written and recorded. I've taken thousands of showers since last listening to it, and I still can't get the Suck off. I had to replace the CD player in my car, and it leaked suck all over the other songs on my .mp3 player, which also had to be disposed of in a toxic waste receptacle. TMoLS is the primary reason SC sucked, and the reason the rest of the SC tracks cannot be objectively evaluated apart from the residual Suck of that single track.

The only thing that rivals my passion for DT is my absolute revulsion of this worst, by the numbers, phoned in, bored to tears track. It is IMO the perfect snapshot of everything that was wrong with the band in the mid 00's. I fucking hate that song, and I hate it so much it makes me hate the whole album. Plus the lyrics to most of the songs are just plain silly. It was like they turned into some teen-age Norwegian death metal band writing about fantasy monsters and ghosts, and TMoLS is the ultimate example of this misguided and ridiculous image the band tried to develop when they signed to Roadrunner. Guys in their 40's singing about mummies and comic books. Really? It was embarrassing and transparent, DT trying to be something they weren't.

I fucking hate that song and everything it represents in DT history. By the time it reached the first chorus, I knew the train and the tracks were going in two different directions.

Oh my god.

[Gadough]

But....but...I like The Ministry of Lost Souls...

Does this mean I suck too?

[bss4life15]

TMOLS is a top ten DT song for me.

[Vivace]

I remember nothing but praise when BC&SL came out. Where did those people go?

[Jamesman42]

I remember nothing but praise when BC&SL came out. Where did those people go?

It quickly wore off, I won't lie, I was praising it when it first came out. Now it's just meh. MEH BLOBVANDAM

[BlobVanDam]

The epic Suck that is TMoLS not only sucked so badly that it dragged SC into the cesspool of worst DT album ever, it also retroactively pulled Octavarium in the "meh" catagory, and cast a pre-emptive shadow of Suck over BCSL. In fact, the song was so bad, it tainted every other single song released by any band, anywhere, during the month it was released, as well as drastically decreased the property value of the studio building in which is was written and recorded. I've taken thousands of showers since last listening to it, and I still can't get the Suck off. I had to replace the CD player in my car, and it leaked suck all over the other songs on my .mp3 player, which also had to be disposed of in a toxic waste receptacle. TMoLS is the primary reason SC sucked, and the reason the rest of the SC tracks cannot be objectively evaluated apart from the residual Suck of that single track.

The only thing that rivals my passion for DT is my absolute revulsion of this worst, by the numbers, phoned in, bored to tears track. It is IMO the perfect snapshot of everything that was wrong with the band in the mid 00's. I fucking hate that song, and I hate it so much it makes me hate the whole album. Plus the lyrics to most of the songs are just plain silly. It was like they turned into some teen-age Norwegian death metal band writing about fantasy monsters and ghosts, and TMoLS is the ultimate example of this misguided and ridiculous image the band tried to develop when they signed to Roadrunner. Guys in their 40's singing about mummies and comic books. Really? It was embarrassing and transparent, DT trying to be something they weren't.

I fucking hate that song and everything it represents in DT history. By the time it reached the first chorus, I knew the train and the tracks were going in two different directions.

The epic suck of this post just sucked so badly that it dragged the entire thread into suckage, and dragged the rest of DT side into the "meh" category.

[skydivingninja]

But....but...I like The Ministry of Lost Souls...

Does this mean I suck too?

Have you no shame?

Oh, I forgot to mention that the only SC song I like is Constant Motion. I dunno if that makes me a black sheep or something, but take that as you will.

People have all kinds of opinions, but that one is really weird.

Hehe, that is what I was thinking.  It's like saying, "Falling into Infinity stinks, but You Not Me is great!"

In his defense, the song was pretty fun when I saw it live (only time seeing DT so far).  Still no desire to listen to the album version, but live it was a fun, rocking tune.

[YtseJamittaja]

ANTR is one of my favourite songs of all time DT. TMOLS is musically a masterpiece. TSF is great ending for 12 step suite. Nothing wrong with Prophets Of War. Both are good albums, BL&SL is even better.

That's my opinion.

[Gadough]

But....but...I like The Ministry of Lost Souls...

Does this mean I suck too?

Have you no shame?

Have we not established already that I don't.

[gabeh1018]

going along with everyone else, these albums really aren't underrated. I loved SC  so much when it came out in 2007 and listened to it nonstop. I don't find myself listening to the album so much as of late, but never the less it still is a good album with a couple of standout songs. For me, I prefer CM and itPoE pt 1 and tDEN, especially the song's instrumental section.

BCaSL, I gave it several spins when it first came out and found myself liking aNtR and tCoT the best and to this day they are my two favorite songs from this album. I really don't listen to this lately. I am not too big a fan of the overall mix. I think it is somewhat dark if that makes sense. I like Wither, but tSF and tBoT are very mediocre songs. It doesn't help there are only 6 tracks on this album.

Even though some may put these albums at the top of their lists, I think most DT fans prefer their other albums for similar reasons.

[lithium112]

TMOLS is an awesome song. Top 15 DT. Just thought I'd add my 2 cents to the fray.

SC is the first DT album I bought since I only learned about them after Octavarium and I've loved it ever since. ITPOE is a great track (especially when the two parts are combined) and the rest of the songs are awesome and energetic. TMOLS is epic as hell. The only song I don't get the urge to listen to that often is Repentance because the talking part at the end drags a bit.

BC&SL is a great album too - TCOT is like a top 3 song for me, occasionally being #1 when I'm in the mood. ANTR, TSF and Wither are great and ROP and TBOT are pretty good but also songs that don't grab my attention that much. So even though it has those two somewhat lower points, the album as a whole rocks.

So yeah.

TMOLS.

[Jay.Ess]

No piece of music moves me like JP's solo and the acoustic section in The Count Of Tuscany.

SC & BC&SL got me into DT, and I think thats the case because for many its probably their most 'accessible' music, and then after a while you begin to like the older stuff more because its harder to digest (for metalheads, anyway)

[Cruithne]

The problem, for me, is the inconsistency. Not just across the different songs, but within the songs themselves.

ANTR, for example, starts superbly. By about the mid-point I'm starting to feel a bit bored and then the RAWR* section starts and I despair. As a result I rarely, if ever, listen to it.
TCOT should have been a bonafide classic DT song, but not with those lyrics. Personally I find they make the song unlistenable.
Repentance is going great until the spoken word sections... I can cope with the confessions section (apart from Akerfeldt's contribution) but once the pitch shifted commentary voice comes in I switch it off in frustration*
TDEN has some fantastic music. The lyrics and the vocals in the verses ruin it.
Constant Motion has some cracking riffs and one of JP's finest solos. The lyrics are risible and the vocal approach equally so...
...I could go on but I'll leave it there.

As such, the two albums are right at the bottom of the DT pile in terms of my enjoyment. If they were albums from an entirely new band then I'd doubtless have a different opinion of them, but we're talking about the same band that delivered I&W, Awake and SFaM, thus the two albums (along with ToT) are best summed up as: "Can do better".

* both examples where the idea might have had merit, but the fact that Portnoy was allowed to do those parts unconvincingly rather than hire someone to do them properly was evidence that something desperately needed to change. I think most of us just thought they needed an outside producer though...

[robwebster]

I bloody love Systematic Chaos - this brilliant, vivid comic book in a sea of hardbacks. Very meaningless, very silly, but oodles of fun. Won't hear a word said against it. But it's different, so it's controversial for that reason, and it's got a lot of the same flaws (if you call them that) as the previous two albums, so it gets a lot of stick for being the same, too. As it is, though, people tend to go softer on albums if they're not an immediate threat. When it's new, it's scary, so its flaws are almost omens - directions that you abjectly do NOT want Dream Theater to go in, and how the hell could they think this was a good idea? When we're two, three, four albums away, it just becomes part of the tapestry, and then the positive bits are the bits you take from it. Plus, the more vocal people who were so mortally offended by those elements of its direction are likely slowly drop off the fandom as they continue to push certain features of their sound, so opinion does tend to shift. That's why Awake - not well received at all at first - and Falling Into Infinity - practically a message from the devil itself - are now overwhelmingly considered "pretty neat." Six Degrees has gone from a mixed bag to a masterpiece in the time I've been here, and I've been starting to see twitches of a shift for Train of Thought. (Though it'll never reach masterpiece status, sorry Train!) So I imagine Systematic Chaos will eventually turn from a cosmic punchline into a pretty neat album - if nobody's favourite - despite its killer flaws. But I'd give it four years or so.

Black Clouds & Silver Linings, for me, is... ah, among my least favourites. Not because it's flawed, but because it doesn't have any distinguishing features. It's precisely the album you'd have expected when the tracklisting came out. It was just Dream Theater being Dream Theater. Writing Dream Theater songs. Its obligation to contain The Shattered Fortress doesn't help - nice way to finish the saga, but it becomes kind of dead weight in the tracklisting. Also strikes me as a very "safe" album. "They like epics? Let's give them epics." I think, honestly, you can tell it was an album directed by a man tired of being in the band. Which is why, honestly, I wasn't worried about the change in management for a second. If you dig up my posts from around the time Mike Portnoy left (and I urge you not to), I kind of went all Mordin Solus - short sentences, excited! Could be good. Could be brilliant. Was an exciting occasion. BCSL was very safe, and having a new man - especially one as mild-mannered, creative and all-round wonderful as John Petrucci - inherit Mike Portnoy's throne felt a bit like the universe's answer to all that. And I think it's why A Dramatic Turn of Events didn't disappoint. It was an adventurous band finally being adventurous again. All drum-synths and tickle-sections and Beneath the Surface.

I've gone off piste again. Neither of those paragraphs ended up on topic. Just... rambles, vaguely dedicated to the memory of each album. I should have one of those collars.



EDIT: Also, has anyone checked WildeSilas' prescriptions lately?

[Zydar]

I liked SC when I first heard it (I re-discovered DT in 2007 after only heard I&W and Awake a few years earlier). But when I heard their other albums, SC quickly fell to the bottom of my ranking list. None of the songs on it could appear on my DT Top 30 list if I made one, although I quite enjoy Forsaken. It has two of my least favourite DT songs ever on it, TMOLS and Repentance.

I loved BCSL when it was released, and I ranked it as high as #4 on my DT album list. Now it has dropped a few notches for me, but it has still aged better than SC. My favourites on it are TBOT, ANTR, and Wither. The only real "dud" for me on it is TSF, which I see as too much of a cut & paste song for me to enjoy.

If I would make one single album out of these two, the tracklist would be something like this:

1. A Nightmare To Remember
2. Forsaken
3. The Best of Times
4. Wither
5. Constant Motion
6. The Count of Tuscany

[Vivace]

I remember nothing but praise when BC&SL came out. Where did those people go?

It quickly wore off, I won't lie, I was praising it when it first came out. Now it's just meh. MEH BLOBVANDAM

that's a lot of people suffering from the same problem. I find very hard to believe. I love BC. Probably the best Jordan era album they cut, exception to ADTOE. But hey, opinions vary.

[toro]

The epic Suck that is TMoLS not only sucked so badly that it dragged SC into the cesspool of worst DT album ever, it also retroactively pulled Octavarium in the "meh" catagory, and cast a pre-emptive shadow of Suck over BCSL. In fact, the song was so bad, it tainted every other single song released by any band, anywhere, during the month it was released, as well as drastically decreased the property value of the studio building in which is was written and recorded. I've taken thousands of showers since last listening to it, and I still can't get the Suck off. I had to replace the CD player in my car, and it leaked suck all over the other songs on my .mp3 player, which also had to be disposed of in a toxic waste receptacle. TMoLS is the primary reason SC sucked, and the reason the rest of the SC tracks cannot be objectively evaluated apart from the residual Suck of that single track.

The only thing that rivals my passion for DT is my absolute revulsion of this worst, by the numbers, phoned in, bored to tears track. It is IMO the perfect snapshot of everything that was wrong with the band in the mid 00's. I fucking hate that song, and I hate it so much it makes me hate the whole album. Plus the lyrics to most of the songs are just plain silly. It was like they turned into some teen-age Norwegian death metal band writing about fantasy monsters and ghosts, and TMoLS is the ultimate example of this misguided and ridiculous image the band tried to develop when they signed to Roadrunner. Guys in their 40's singing about mummies and comic books. Really? It was embarrassing and transparent, DT trying to be something they weren't.

I fucking hate that song and everything it represents in DT history. By the time it reached the first chorus, I knew the train and the tracks were going in two different directions.

QFT. TMOLS deserves this and much more.

[Jamesman42]

that's a lot of people suffering from the same problem. I find very hard to believe.

lol

[theseoafs]

I remember nothing but praise when BC&SL came out. Where did those people go?

It quickly wore off, I won't lie, I was praising it when it first came out. Now it's just meh. MEH BLOBVANDAM

that's a lot of people suffering from the same problem. I find very hard to believe. I love BC. Probably the best Jordan era album they cut, exception to ADTOE. But hey, opinions vary.

I'd say what jamesman describes is pretty much universal, and not at all "hard to believe". A majority of serious DT fans are probably so happy about having a new album that their perception of it is skewed. Only after they've listened to it several times and truly understand the music within will they be able to accurately judge it. In many cases, the majority opinion about an album drops because people have realized the music isn't as great as they thought it was.

Also... ADTOE > BCSL > all the other albums after Falling into Infinity, including Scenes from a Memory and SDOIT?

[kirksnosehair]

Yeah, I hate this idea that some have that people hate on TDEN or CM just because they are metal, like some of us can't handle or appreciate metal tunes, even straight-forward ones.  That is bogus.

I'm a huge fan of metal, probably 75% of my album collection is metal.  I don't dislike those songs because they're "metal" at all.  I dislike them because....I dislike them.  Whenever I listen to SC (which is pretty rarely) I listen to ITPOE (part 1 - this is one of my favorite DT tunes ever) TMOLS and ITPOE part 2, I almost always skip the rest of the album.  I think it's among their weakest album ever.