DREAM THEATER RELEASES TRAILER FOR NEW DVD, BLU-RAY, CD

[cramx3]

Instead of telling someone to stop being cocky, why don't you all disprove him?

I know nothing about technicalities of music as I'm not a musician just a fan so I couldn't tell you. I think JLB sounds great pretty much always. CiM is easily the worst live release and I don't need trained ears to figure that out.

[wolfking]

no it wasn't

Listen to the first verse of Panic Attack. Of all things in a DT show, James would not be off pitch during that verse. On the word "grow" (choking me, worries grow), he says more of a "growaah" and the ahh is tuned back up to the Eb that the phrase starts on. Clearly when he sang that, he did not do that live. The "wha" would have just been sliding upwards a little for emotional effect and it would sound natural. The auto tune took out the emotion and made it sound weird and unnatural.

If the auto tune was selectively put on, this part would have been left out. Listening to the rest of the song, the auto tune remains on like a switch the entire song, and you can tell it was not the kind where they went through each note in the studio, because some of the notes are even tuned to the wrong pitch.

This doesn't sound unnatural to me at all.  Why could he have not done that live?

[ariich]

Listen to the first verse of Panic Attack. Of all things in a DT show, James would not be off pitch during that verse.

Why not? For such an inexperienced singer you should really know that it's possible to go off pitch on any note at any time.

[DebraKadabra]

Maybe he likes it. Or maybe he's a singer trying to get some insights or techniques from a highly successful vocalist whose style he greatly admires! That would be cool, actually 

All day every day?

Day after day and night after night?

[Jinx]

Someone suggested a few pages back that we spam the Eagle Rock page on facebook until we get answers. I support this.

[TheAtliator]

Instead of telling someone to stop being cocky, why don't you all disprove him?

This is what I want to see.

Listen to the first verse of Panic Attack. Of all things in a DT show, James would not be off pitch during that verse.

Why not? For such an inexperienced singer you should really know that it's possible to go off pitch on any note at any time.

First, I've been singing since I was 4, but of course those singers I mentioned have been singing much much longer than I've even been alive, but anyway, careful with the word inexperienced. Second, not impossible, but unlikely for that specific spot.

This doesn't sound unnatural to me at all.  Why could he have not done that live?

Again, from watching him SO much- he adds "waa's" and "oohs" to the end of many words, but I don't think I've ever heard them just casually snap back up to the next pitch like that. I realized that in this recording, and then to prove my point, I listened to fan shot footage from that night and saw I was right- his voice did not sound like it was coming through a telephone and that note did Not go up like it does on the DVD.

[Infinite Cactus]

I think James just had a few off nights.  Not only do I not hear any pitch correction software, I doubt Dream Theater would be that careless to leave something so "obvious" in there. I think dude just sang less than stellar.

[TheAtliator]

I think James just had a few off nights.  Not only do I not hear any pitch correction software, I doubt Dream Theater would be that careless to leave something so "obvious" in there. I think dude just sang less than stellar.

I wish I could tell you where the fan shot footage is so that you can hear his performance was flawless before the damn careless tuning..

[nikatapi]

I think James just had a few off nights.  Not only do I not hear any pitch correction software, I doubt Dream Theater would be that careless to leave something so "obvious" in there. I think dude just sang less than stellar.

I think that the end product was cheap as hell and the voice had a lot of processing. I've heard bootlegs from different nights during that tour, and i've seen a live performance as well, James sounded great, while on CiM he sounds like shit, there was so much processing in his voice it becomes unbearable.

The pitch correction is very obvious and very badly implemented.

[MoraWintersoul]

I always believed it was probably a combination of an off night and processing that was put on to hide the fact it was poorly recorded. Since most of that just sounds pretty awful. Again, it's not like it's impossible for James to have had really off nights on the Chaos tour, but Atliator (lol nice username change) is right, a lot of what sounds wrong doesn't sound like James normally sounds like when he sounds wrong... does that make any sense?

[wasteland]

Totally! I've never heard James sounding that way in any recording of that tour. It's true that he often sounded weird and "weak" as if his lacked some strenght in worst songs of CiM, but the cheap-telephone effect cannot be heard in any bootleg. This must mean something.

[Nihil-Morari]

't Was all soundboard recordings, right?

[wasteland]

't Was all soundboard recordings, right?

If he sounded acceptable on many good sounding bootlegs I would presume he sounded even better on raw soundboard recording.

[Nihil-Morari]

Well, yeah, you're right. Right notes don't really become wrong notes, but y'know, in audience recordings a lot of finesses can be overshadowed by the raw power and noise of the entire band. With a proper live recording there's a lot of mixing (they often add room mics to the total sound to make it sound more lively), but when only using soundboard recordings (and who knows what material they had) there could be a lot of compression going on even before the postproduction.

Final comment on the pitch correction, I'm sure it has been used, but selectively, by listening to Panic Attack everyone can here that there's a lot of slides, glides and vibrato, something that would've been totally impossible when some sort of correction filter had been added to the entire performance.

[wasteland]

Well, yeah, you're right. Right notes don't really become wrong notes, but y'know, in audience recordings a lot of finesses can be overshadowed by the raw power and noise of the entire band. With a proper live recording there's a lot of mixing (they often add room mics to the total sound to make it sound more lively), but when only using soundboard recordings (and who knows what material they had) there could be a lot of compression going on even before the postproduction.

Final comment on the pitch correction, I'm sure it has been used, but selectively, by listening to Panic Attack everyone can here that there's a lot of slides, glides and vibrato, something that would've been totally impossible when some sort of correction filter had been added to the entire performance.

Try checking out the Progressive Nation 2008 IFCR if you have it or know how to get it. That's a SB recording for sure, and even though James doesn't sound incredible you can argue that his singing is more than OK.

[Perpetual Change]

Aliator, you are just being extremely stubborn. JLB singing somewhat flat has been an issue with him since the very beginning, and it says that right in Lifting Shadows. The post-processing in CiM doesn't help, but JLB doesn't get a free pass.

[wolfking]

I think James just had a few off nights.  Not only do I not hear any pitch correction software, I doubt Dream Theater would be that careless to leave something so "obvious" in there. I think dude just sang less than stellar.

I wish I could tell you where the fan shot footage is so that you can hear his performance was flawless before the damn careless tuning..

So, you're saying that the auto tune was put on his voice on the recording, not the show? 

And you're saying there is auto tune, which I still don't believe, yet his performance was flawless?  If his performance was flawless, why autotune?  And isn't autotune usually applied in the live setting?

[Perpetual Change]

I think it sounds like autotune in the post-production, wolf. I agree that it does make James' voice sound worse, but afterwards that's where Atliator's criticism fails. The auto-tune is there because James probably sung the whole thing ever-so-slightly flat, which isn't that unusual since the official biography of Dream Theater states that has been one of his recurring issues.

[wolfking]

Fair enough.  I thought the band always said that they have never used auto tune, but was unaware that it was common for live performances to be altered in the studio with auto tune, overdubs yes, but never thought about auto tune. 

If that's the case perhaps that's why I never really had a problem with the vocals on CIM.  I know James vocal history and that brings up the whole Score auto tune argument also, which has been discussed 100 times.  Then you have something like Budokan that's raw as hell and possibly one of James' most flat and weakest performances ever put to tape.

[Perpetual Change]

The level of autotune used is much different than what you'd here in a hip hop song as I understand it.

James did admit on his forum awhile back that autotune does sometimes get applied to his voice in post-production. He never ever uses it live though.

[wolfking]

Hmm, never knew that.  Yeah, I know it would only be minor to improve certain notes up or down 1/4, 1/2 step or whatever.

[MoraWintersoul]

CiM is messy and badly recorded enough that it doesn't really matter. What we do know is that according to MP's/JP's/other engineers' opinion, it is the best thing they could get out in those circumstances in regards to the quality of the actual audio/video recordings. Nobody would put out a version where James alone sounds significantly worse, and no one would take a flawless performance and tamper with it, but some all-around sound quality and veritableness (does this make sense? I meant, the trueness of the recording, the how-it-actually-sounded-like) of the performance was probably sacrificed due to the circumstances of how the thing was released.

What we do know is that autotune in Dream Theater recordings, just like in loads of other bands' recordings, is used. We know pitch correction's been used on vocals in post-production of live shows and in the studio, but in most cases, not a lot of it. Thanks to MP mostly, we know which vocal/instrumental performances over the years have been overdubbed or fixed (from the total overdubbing of vocs on LatM to minimal pitch correction on Score or fixing of the backing vocals on LSFNY). They're all pretty open about it and that's one of the things I like with DT.

JLB doesn't get a free pass due to the messiness of the post-production and the very recording of CiM, but since he's had much better performances than the ones recorded for CiM on that very tour, it is very likely they could have made a great DVD on that tour if they had enough time to prepare all that stuff. And we'll never know just how much the actual singing on the DVD we have has been tampered with, but I know how James sounds on a bad night, and on a bad night during that tour, and some of the things that don't sound good on the DVD don't align with that. The tampering probably wasn't significant enough to create problems we hear in some of the performances, but it just doesn't help and I don't like it and I want veeeeeeeeery light pitch correction, if they deem it necessary, on Luna Park.

It is okay that they're being honest about that sorta stuff, but it annoys me that everything needs to be ironed perfect. We know they make mistakes. We like it when they make mistakes and get out of them. We know James is inconsistent and we still love him because he is getting better and better in recent times regardless of consistency issues. Leave the minute of guitarless silence in UAGM on Score. Leave the vocals relatively unprocessed for CiM, it would have been better than the thing we've gotten even if James was in less than optimal condition because this just sounds weird. For the new DVD, leave the drum solo with the flub in, leave mistakes in. Hell, record most of the performances for YJR, then cherry pick the trainwrecks and put them on a CD (Scenes From A World Tour outtakes, anyone?), and name it THIS IS HOW IT SOUNDS LIKE WHEN WE FUCK SHIT UP.

[Nekov]

I want veeeeeeeeery light pitch correction, if they deem it necessary, on Luna Park.

I don't think it will be necessary at all, those two nights were his best performances by far, at least from the times I've seen them live

[wasteland]

I want veeeeeeeeery light pitch correction, if they deem it necessary, on Luna Park.

I don't think it will be necessary at all, those two nights were his best performances by far, at least from the times I've seen them live

Besides, I think they could easily patch an occasional wrong note with the equivalent (assuming it's better performed) from the second night, for the songs that were played twice.

[MoraWintersoul]

What I meant was that they're probably going to treat it in post-production because that's just the way things are done, and I want MINIMAL treatment. I want to hear everything really exactly as it was, warts and all. There were no significant warts so they could just throw it all in exactly as it is.

[Nekov]

Can they do that? Cause that's a great option if the can. Unless of course they missed the note both nights 

[BlobVanDam]

What I meant was that they're probably going to treat it in post-production because that's just the way things are done, and I want MINIMAL treatment. I want to hear everything really exactly as it was, warts and all. There were no significant warts so they could just throw it all in exactly as it is.

Dream Theater have never done that much in post to JLB's vocals (for the videos, that is).
I assume it will be much like Score, where they'll apply very light pitch correction overall (which doesn't alter the natural sound of the vocals at all and is barely noticeable, but just fixes up the occasional intonation problem that is inevitable for a completely live vocal), then if there's the odd line that was a bit worse to save through such subtle means, they'll dub it in.
From what I recall of the tiny snippet we got of 6:00, I didn't hear noticeable pitch correction, and JLB sounded really good. I don't think there's any reason for concern.

[Kotowboy]

^ Unlike S&M where there is obvious pitch correction all over Hetfield's voice because he has never sung that well for an entire concert before or since


Speaking of Metallica - it's funny spotting the overdubs on Cunning Stunts where what you're seeing bares zero relation to what you 're hearing.

One of the most obvious is the beginning of Hero Of The Day when Het sings " The window burns to light the way back home . "

He finishes the line but he shuts his mouth before he does - so it's clearly not the same performance.

There's a ton of moments all over that concert where it's obvious they've just chucked in shots that aren't from the same song.

[Dreamer81]

From FB Eagle Rock page:
Eagle Rock Entertainment News about this release will announced shortly over on Dream Theater's official page.

shortly can mean 1 month or 1 day, i'll go with the first in this case!!

[MoraWintersoul]

From FB Eagle Rock page:
Eagle Rock Entertainment News about this release will announced shortly over on Dream Theater's official page.

shortly can mean 1 month or 1 day, i'll go with the first in this case!!

THANK FUCKING GOD in that case.

[Dream Team]

There are vastly superior versions of Scarred, Lines in the Sand and Blind Faith found in the Bucharest bootleg; which is kind of sad considering CiM is an official release.

Yes indeed. Awesome DVD.

[ResultsMayVary]

I bet we'll see some information posted sometime today about the release.

[nikatapi]

From FB Eagle Rock page:
Eagle Rock Entertainment News about this release will announced shortly over on Dream Theater's official page.

shortly can mean 1 month or 1 day, i'll go with the first in this case!!

Can't wait to hear the news 2 months from now

[Zydar]

Color me mildly excited.

[The Stray Seed]

Let's see.