2012 Golden God Awards Nominees

[DebraKadabra]

So wait, let me get this straight: people complain when awards shows only go for the top-charting bands when DT (or any other 'good' bands) aren't nominated, but when they're nominated for a 'questionable' category they point to the charts as reason for them to not be there?

It makes perfect sense in this case since you can only use the Portnoy departure angle so much to try to establish an arguement for DT not being at the top of their game already. This is their track record for peak position on the US Billboard charts for every album dating back to Train of Thought:

Train of Thought:                      53
Octavarium:                             36
Systematic Chaos:                    19
Black Clouds & Silver Linings:      6
A Dramatic Turn of Events:          8

So, as you can clearly see, the only album that didn't chart higher than its predecessor (since Train of Thought anyway) is ADToE which only makes the term "comeback" even more unfitting. Beyond all that. there is zero prestige associated with these awards if you look at how shoddily they were apparently thrown together. You'd think that since this is a metal oriented awards thing, that it wouldn't be so miserably rife with clique-ish voting patterns and, since it obviously is, it's even worse than the Grammy's since it's at least posturing itself as being receptive to metal yet looks like it had a voting body of less than 8 people.

^ True.  The comeback award?  Really?  Where did they go to, exactly?

[orcus116]

Though one could argue that this being a more niche award they'd be more aware of the actual output coming out of a band like Dream Theater compared to their capabilities over the last few albums as opposed to something like the Grammys which is almost always surface level as far as the music scene goes. Sure there is a solid facet of fans that will say that Dream Theater has been incredibly consistent or getting better on each album but once you put feelers out past your average prog slanted site the reviews over the last few albums have usually drawn the conclusion of the band getting stale in some form or another. It's impossible to judge whether or not the subtraction of Portnoy and addition of Mangini was a major factor but the newer album seems to have gotten a lot better reception from sites other than the ones that just routinely slap 9s or 10s on Dream Theater albums because of name only.

[BlobVanDam]

So basically you're saying that if you exclude all of the positive reviews for the past two albums, there were negative reviews? Wow.

DT have continued an upward trend in popularity and recognition, especially through SC and BCASL, and they continued their steady 2 year album cycle. Even if ADTOE is an improvement over BCASL (which I'm not going to argue here), it's still by no stretch a comeback album.

[Sigz]

It makes perfect sense in this case since you can only use the Portnoy departure angle so much to try to establish an arguement for DT not being at the top of their game already.

Dude, it's music. It's subjective. DT was pretty much on an exponential downhill slide from SDOIT to SC, with BCSL being only a minor increase in quality from SC. To me ADTOE was easily a comeback album, of course IMHO.

My point remains though: people bitch and moan about how shallow major awards are, then use mainstream charts to prove why their favorite band doesn't deserve an award they think is bad.

[black_biff_stadler]

I don't think the collective attitude was that the award is bad so much as it's just plain inaccurate. ToT had a pretty negative reaction at first yet is now average at worst among DT fans and many like it pretty well. 8VM is hit or miss but the title track remains one of their most popular to date, most people around here place TRoAE as their second favorite of the AA Saga tracks, and Sacrificed Sons is held in fairly high regard as well. SC is about the only album (since FII) where they've generally had a bad reception and, despite what people say about BC&SL, The Count of Tuscany is considered a true DT classic by most fans and the only tracks on it that get any shit are A Rite of Passage and A Nightmare to Remember and 90% of people that trash ANTR only do so because of MP's pisspoor stab at death metal vocals which means most of them apparently like the rest of the song since they seldom bother griping about any other parts of it.

[Dark Castle]

A Rite to Passage gets shit?  I'll never keep up with the gals it seems, shucks.

[orcus116]

So basically you're saying that if you exclude all of the positive reviews for the past two albums, there were negative reviews? Wow.

Point out where I said that.

[KevShmev]

Though one could argue that this being a more niche award they'd be more aware of the actual output coming out of a band like Dream Theater compared to their capabilities over the last few albums as opposed to something like the Grammys which is almost always surface level as far as the music scene goes. Sure there is a solid facet of fans that will say that Dream Theater has been incredibly consistent or getting better on each album but once you put feelers out past your average prog slanted site the reviews over the last few albums have usually drawn the conclusion of the band getting stale in some form or another. It's impossible to judge whether or not the subtraction of Portnoy and addition of Mangini was a major factor but the newer album seems to have gotten a lot better reception from sites other than the ones that just routinely slap 9s or 10s on Dream Theater albums because of name only.

I think this makes a lot of sense.  Granted, DT has never fallen into the abyss where making a great album again would be considered a true comeback, but I can totally see how the greatness of ADTOE vs. much of what they had done over the last decade prior to it, could be considered a major bounce back.

[BlobVanDam]

So basically you're saying that if you exclude all of the positive reviews for the past two albums, there were negative reviews? Wow.

Point out where I said that.

You decided to arbitrarily dismiss positive reviews that don't agree with your own opinion because you've decided they're "prog slanted" ie. actually in the correct genre of the albums in question, and probably the most representative reviews if anything. I'm sorry, but your argument is ridiculous, and you know it.
By no stretch of any reasonable imagination is ADTOE a comeback album.

[KevShmev]

You decided to arbitrarily dismiss positive reviews that don't agree with your own opinion because you've decided they're "prog slanted" ie. actually in the correct genre of the albums in question, and probably the most representative reviews if anything.

I disagree.  I have noticed, that with any subgenre, those sites are more likely to give albums in their subgenre raving reviews vs. sites that are more general.  Go to any indie site and they will slobber over just about album released by one of their "golden boys," and given the lack of popularity of prog in general these days, when the most popular current prog band releases an album, it would be detrimental to the subgenre itself to not give glowing reviews to albums by that band - I mean, what does it say about prog if prog sites are slamming albums by the subgenre's current standard bearer - so DT is always gonna get great reviews from just about any prog site, regardless of quality. 

Besides, reviews from critics/sites don't mean squat anyway.  Critics ripped the crap out of Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd back in the 70s, and those bands have proven to have been two of the best and most popular bands of that decade.  Most critics have an agenda, aside from what I already said above.  Some bands can do no wrong, and some bands can never do any right, when it comes to critics.

[orcus116]

So basically you're saying that if you exclude all of the positive reviews for the past two albums, there were negative reviews? Wow.

Point out where I said that.

You decided to arbitrarily dismiss positive reviews that don't agree with your own opinion because you've decided they're "prog slanted" ie. actually in the correct genre of the albums in question, and probably the most representative reviews if anything. I'm sorry, but your argument is ridiculous, and you know it.
By no stretch of any reasonable imagination is ADTOE a comeback album.

I didn't arbitrarily dismiss anything, don't shove motives in my argument. Like Kev just pointed out they'll always get those gushing reviews from that people specialized towards that type of music but as you move further and further out into music magazines and websites that are more generalized there's a much more lukewarm feeling towards those albums.

[theseoafs]

I think Blob has a point: if anyone's going to write more accurate DT reviews, it's the people who know and appreciate prog, right?

[BlobVanDam]

You decided to arbitrarily dismiss positive reviews that don't agree with your own opinion because you've decided they're "prog slanted" ie. actually in the correct genre of the albums in question, and probably the most representative reviews if anything.

I disagree.  I have noticed, that with any subgenre, those sites are more likely to give albums in their subgenre raving reviews vs. sites that are more general.  Go to any indie site and they will slobber over just about album released by one of their "golden boys," and given the lack of popularity of prog in general these days, when the most popular current prog band releases an album, it would be detrimental to the subgenre itself to not give glowing reviews to albums by that band - I mean, what does it say about prog if prog sites are slamming albums by the subgenre's current standard bearer - so DT is always gonna get great reviews from just about any prog site, regardless of quality. 

Besides, reviews from critics/sites don't mean squat anyway.  Critics ripped the crap out of Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd back in the 70s, and those bands have proven to have been two of the best and most popular bands of that decade.  Most critics have an agenda, aside from what I already said above.  Some bands can do no wrong, and some bands can never do any right, when it comes to critics.

Ok, well if we're dismissing reviews as unreliable, then any other subjective opinion here should be equally void. That leaves the hard figures.
DT have continued a steady upward trend of popularity, recognition, and attendance over the past decade when these apparent "weaker" albums were being released. This doesn't happen if you're continually pumping out crap. When you look at the objective figures, the notion of ADTOE being a comeback has virtually no basis imo.

[orcus116]

DT have continued a steady upward trend of popularity, recognition, and attendance over the past decade when these apparent "weaker" albums were being released. This doesn't happen if you're continually pumping out crap.

[KevShmev]

I think Blob has a point: if anyone's going to write more accurate DT reviews, it's the people who know and appreciate prog, right?

In theory, but just like bonehead mainstream critics are likely to bash a prog album just because it's prog, a prog site is just as likely to give it tons of love just because it's prog.  It goes both ways here.

[BlobVanDam]

I think Blob has a point: if anyone's going to write more accurate DT reviews, it's the people who know and appreciate prog, right?

In theory, but just like bonehead mainstream critics are likely to bash a prog album just because it's prog, a prog site is just as likely to give it tons of love just because it's prog.  It goes both ways here.

The whole process of selectively omitting reviews is just far too subjective and biased to take any of it into consideration at all for this argument imo.

[orcus116]

I think that's where you're confused. I wasn't proposing to omit anything it's just that the further out you get the collective of reviews seems to go from 8.5/9.0 to around 6.0/7.0 (BS but ballpark numbers).

[BlobVanDam]

I think that's where you're confused. I wasn't proposing to omit anything it's just that the further out you get the collective of reviews seems to go from 8.5/9.0 to around 6.0/7.0 (BS but ballpark numbers).

"Further out" from what? The actual target audience reviewing it? Further out just makes the reviews less reliable as indicative of anything at all.

[Ben_Jamin]

I just had to laugh at best vocalist.

[Millais]

Most Dedicated Fans

• Asking Alexandria
• Avenged Sevenfold
• Black Veil Brides
• Evanescence
• Falling in Reverse
• HIM
• Dream Theater 

[black_biff_stadler]

If Black Veil Brides don't sweep this thing, I've lost all faith in music awards in general.