That's true! That's very true, actually, and you're completely right - it's "EVERYONE SURVIVED" that I remember. Memory is a dirty magnifying glass, some things get exaggerated, others are obscured completely, and I've got a hunch we're back to that message board echo chamber! Another week or two in the studio could've ironed that out - but I know they agonised over that bit. I don't think they ever got it to a place where it quite worked at 100%, regrettably, because although it's only a moment's lapse, that moment is sort of the money shot! It's a bit like how everyone complained when JLB missed the note on Live Scenes. ANtR is still pegged in my head as "Very promising, but it needs a little more work," and I think - for all you're absolutely correct and it's mostly great - it is one of the moments that I would go back to and consider tweaking.
I think you're right that we're in echo chamber territory again, given that the only lines from that section that seem to have lived on in message board memory are "Day after day" and "Everyone survived."
I think maybe there's a tiny lapse, but I still think it works (and Mike certainly nails the money shot, which actually comes right after in my judgement—"ROOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRR"—and honestly, in my opinion, which is sure to cause more angry responses, that's practically as iconic of a vocal moment as something like "I'm sick of all you hypocrites").
And, interestingly, this is actually a case where the music followed the lyrics—the original vocal melody was a high James one, and Mike and John argued and agonized over what it should be, with the final choice being a compromise between clean vocals and full death growls. I'm sure one of the things they discussed was how that would work with the lyrics, and I'm sure that John had some concerns, but in the end, the lyrics were John's, they were written before Mike's vocal melody was, and as the co-producer, co-composer and lyricist I don't think John would have abided a vocal style that betrayed the intended emotion of his lyrics.
So perhaps it could have been a little clearer, but personally, I've never had a problem with it. I just make sure no one's around and then growl along.
I don't think shortness and brevity are necessarily the same thing - if they were, and I was the short song guy, I wouldn't be listening to DT at all! But take Illumination Theory, I think Illumination Theory is incredibly witty, every note in its right place. It's 19 minutes, and while it's not perhaps as compact as it could be, it's as compact as it should be. I don't think that's true of A Nightmare to Remember in the same way. I don't think it's true of any of BCSL, actually, which is probably why I'm a little cold on it. I like your comparison of The Ministry of Lost Souls, though. I think the difference with the Ministry (and Sacrificed Sons before it) is that the mid-section point blank couldn't work on its own. It might not be essential to the rest of the song* but the song is essential to it. That's not true of A Nightmare to Remember in the same way - Beautiful Agony has a structure of its own, threaded in. It's got the traditional verse, chorus, verse, chorus thing, and that gives it its own life, in a way that doesn't work for Ministry.
I think your point about shortness and brevity is a good one, and I agree about Illumination Theory. I also agree that it's not as true of A Nightmare to Remember, though I don't think that it is so long as to overstay its welcome.
I disagree about all of BCSL, though, and I'm not even going to be a smartass and say Wither, however strong the temptation is. I think the album certainly has moments of excess, and that those include the last few minutes of ANTR, the solo section of AROP, and a few parts of TSF, though none of these excesses are too excessive for me to love all there songs. But... The Best of Times and The Count of Tuscany? I think those songs are as compact as they should be. I'm not in love with all of The Best of Times, but there's no sections that feel superfluous or overlong to me. I've occasionally thought that the song is a bit long but have never found any section that I feel could be cut, so I think my problems with it don't stem from length.
The Count of Tuscany definitely feels to me like Illumination Theory in the sense of being a 19 minute song that's exactly as compact as it should be. TCOT actually feels, despite its length, more compact than IT to me. Not that that's a negative for either song, it just seems like TCOT was written with a shorter song in mind that just wound up getting filled with musical ideas that added to its length (not unlike how Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence was written to be a 20 minute song but soon became so filled with musical ideas that it became a 40 minute song), while IT was conceived as a much more ambitious, 20 minute song, and ended up being written exactly that way. Each song is written in a way that is right for what it is, and I think more or less music would only harm either one.
I think your difference between the middles of TMOLS and ANTR could be a relevant difference, but I think there's still a sense in which my comparison is still valid. And I also would argue for TMOLS (but not for Sacrificed Sons) that the instrumental section wouldn't require much more fleshing out than Hell's Kitchen got or Beautiful Agony would need to become a standalone instrumental. I even figured out what I would call it: The Water's Edge. But, as I do agree with and accept your "it works with the lyrics about the afterlife" explanation (and I do think that either John and/or James had in mind the fact that the midsections work with the lyrics or they both got lucky, and that it matters little either way, because they do in fact work), and would leave the instrumental in the song given the choice.
To the Slaughter of the Damned - I know what you mean. The Slaughter of the Damned is oh so tiny, and oh so brilliant, but it's also cuttable, and I can't promise that I wouldn't end up deleting it entirely.
Angels fall, all for you, you damn heretic!
I guess it's fortunate for me that you didn't produce
Systematic Chaos, because I love The Slaughter of the Damned.
In fairness, they've never quite got that transition right, live - Heretic stops, and the drums come in on their own, and you're right, it sort of loses something. I'm not entirely sure what I'd do with Slaughter, The Reckoning and Salvation. I think I'd want to tie them together with a sort of overture - more a conclusion - incorporating riffs from all the other songs, but yes, it's weird. There's part of me that thinks, "Well, they've done a lot of big finishes, they've done a lot of instrumental sections, I'm not too hot on The Reckoning anyway..." if I were the band's producer, rewriting them entirely would certainly be something I'd put on the table. I think Heretic is begging for room to breathe, though. It's so good. It deserves its own life.
I've made my peace with The Reckoning. I think it's easily the weakest part of the song, and I would like the song better if they had—just going to be blunt about this—written a better instrumental section (I think I probably need some kind of long dash allowance, to the effect that I can only use them a certain number of times every so many words). But it's not total scrap—there's some good parts in there, especially towards the end, and it transitions exceedingly well into Salvation. The reprise of the main theme there is just so well timed. Salvation I think is a great final section for an epic, not as good as Razor's Edge or The Crimson Sunset, but almost on par with Surrender, Trust & Passion or Losing Time/Grand Finale.
I love Heretic—it's my favorite section of the piece by far. But I'm not sure it should stand as its own song. For me, it's like... Someone Like Him, perhaps (just the vocal section proper, minus the intro). It's very good and has a verse-chorus section like a song, but I think it works exceptionally well as a buildup to the next part of a longer song and I'm not sure how much it would benefit from being pulled out and given an outro and forced to stand alone as a 4-5 minute piece. I mean, I'm sure both would be good songs in that context, but I think both are better off as part of Octavarium and In the Presence of Enemies. Though, again, I think it would be at least interesting if they had fleshed some of those kind of things out, like Someone Like Him, Heretic, maybe even Slaughter of the Damned and released those versions as bonus tracks for deluxe editions or something. Just a thought.