Dream Theater self titled album discussion - [SPOILER FREE DISCUSSION ONLY]

[Elite]

  That's right, I forgot. 

But my general point still stands.

Fail bosky.

But in fairness, there are a few people without English as their native language whose use of it is really great, like Milena, Marco and the other Rich.

Why thank you! Though I must add that although Dutch is my first language, my mother is English (so I'm half-English if you will) and my stepdad was too, so I basically spoke English at home for some part of my life as well. I was raised in Dutch though, the English part came later in my life, but having the family abroad probably helped.

[bosk1]

I`m gonna be out of here until 9/24.

Why yes.  Yes, you are.  Since I have already posted about people who are not insiders posting as if they are, and you insist in pushing the issue and ignoring other warnings, I'll make sure you don't come back until at least 9/24.  Bye.

[JayOctavarium]

oooorrrr... the album is going to come out and I am going to LOOOOOVE it. It's going to be either black or white. Love or Hate. I can feel it

[SeRoX]

The thing is I feel about the new album we hear different James LaBrie, pushing his limits, kind of using the style of  both I&W and Awake. I think he was in the safe zone on ADOTE.

[Labrie1984]

I would like James to be using his past singing style on the new record. His high-pitched and raspy voice is unique, combined with his vibrato. Nevertheless, he must think about the live setting before. He should reach the high notes each and every night.

[TheGreatPretender]

I would like James to be using his past singing style on the new record. His high-pitched and raspy voice is unique, combined with his vibrato. Nevertheless, he must think about the live setting before. He should reach the high notes each and every night.

Well, he doesn't have to go to the very top of his range necessarily. I mean, if he even went as high as he did on SC, songs like ITPOE and Forsaken, I'd be satisfied.

[DarkLord_Lalinc]

Maybe some people aren't aware of the fact that he recorded Awake nearly 20 years ago, his voice has gone through some drastic changes since then 

Although his voice is at a stable point nowadays, he can't sing anymore like he did on the Awake/I&W days. The heaviest his voice can get right now is probably something Train of Thought/Systematic Chaos/Static Impulse-ish. Doesn't mean it's bad, though. I have no problems with his voice, and I rather have him sing comfortable vocal melodies and have him perform them nicely live instead of soaring his lungs out in the studio and not be able to recreate that in concerts.

[Scotto123]

Man this thread is ridiculous. This is my response:

[Mosh]

What? There's a real discussion going on now, why try to derail it?

I hope James stays away from the raspy sound. I love it on Awake, but he's just now starting to really sound great again, I'd hate for him to wreck his voice by singing like that.

[Shadow Ninja 2.0]

Man this thread is ridiculous. This is my response:

[TheGreatPretender]

What? There's a real discussion going on now, why try to derail it?

I hope James stays away from the raspy sound. I love it on Awake, but he's just now starting to really sound great again, I'd hate for him to wreck his voice by singing like that.

He won't wreck his voice if he's doing it properly, and it's always sounded to me like he's doing it properly.

[DarkLord_Lalinc]

Just for the record, and this can be reassured by any singing experts we got in this forum, there's no way to rasp your voice without damaging your vocal chords. Sure, you can minimize the damage, but you can't growl or rasp your voice to your heart's content without expecting any backlash at all.

Well, "damage" is a strong word... maybe "repercussion" fits better.

[RaiseTheKnife]

Ideally, you all should avoid reviews before listening to the album. The problem with reviews is that they shape the way you receive and process an album (a movie, a book, whatever). You can't help it. You start to listen with someonelse's ears. If someone wrote something bad about the drumming or the solos, your senses will be biased, a pre-conception will be there and subconsciously working. If you had not read anything in the first place, maybe you would have not cared at all. Music is a very personal experience. Reviews take it away from us!

I agree with this to the extent it applies to music that I am psyched about and will absolutely buy no matter what.  I want my listening experience to be mine and mine alone.  however, if I'm not a fanboy of a particular artist, and I'm on the fringe of deciding to purchase, or not to purchase, then a review can assist me make an informed decision.

[Voices]

I'd like to see something more like IR. As I said on another thread, he was safe in ADTOE (and great, by the way)...now it is time for him to pull out something like he did back in SC, SI and recently in IR.

[TheGreatPretender]

Just for the record, and this can be reassured by any singing experts we got in this forum, there's no way to rasp your voice without damaging your vocal chords. Sure, you can minimize the damage, but you can't growl or rasp your voice to your heart's content without expecting any backlash at all.

Well, "damage" is a strong word... maybe "repercussion" fits better.

Yeah, but that's like saying, there's no way to do a whole lot of clean singing without damaging your vocal cords. My friend overdid it a couple months ago to the point where his vocal cords were bleeding. Overdoing anything with your voice is never a good thing, but if a singer takes good care of his voice (as I'm sure James does), and uses the proper technique, and not use that grit on every single song like he did back in the I&W touring days (great as it sounded), there shouldn't be any long term reprecussions. Heck, he's had his share of gritty vocals on pretty much every DT album in the past 10+ years, and lately he's been saying how his range and voice is better than it's ever been, since the good poisoning accident.

[DarkLord_Lalinc]

You're right about that. Being a professional singer is incredibly difficult, and for that I tip my hat for James because he's gone through some hard shit and he's still here, singing his ass off. I think that the most important thing for him now, is that he's stable as I said earlier. Since the Octavarium tour, he's been incredibly consistent with his live performances (excluding the horrible MP-picked recordings from Chaos in Motion and some bad nights, of course) and he's been able to handle his voice to a point that he knows its limits and how will it react on stage. Although his voice still maintained that "color" and "tone" from the early days, his Awake - TOT touring period was super shaky and consisted basically of on and off nights. Nowadays, he's making some impessive feats live and that's why I'm expecting Luna Park so much.

[TheGreatPretender]

Either way, as much as I like James' gritty tone, I was always more of a fan of his high, clean vocals, and that's what I thought was missing from ADTOE, so hopefully, he's played around with his range a bit more on the new album, like I said, at least to the extent that he did on Systematic Chaos. I don't think it's that difficult for him to sing songs like Forsaken.

[Daso]

You're right about that. Being a professional singer is incredibly difficult, and for that I tip my hat for James because he's gone through some hard shit and he's still here, singing his ass off. I think that the most important thing for him now, is that he's stable as I said earlier. Since the Octavarium tour, he's been incredibly consistent with his live performances (excluding the horrible MP-picked recordings from Chaos in Motion and some bad nights, of course) and he's been able to handle his voice to a point that he knows its limits and how will it react on stage. Although his voice still maintained that "color" and "tone" from the early days, his Awake - TOT touring period was super shaky and consisted basically of on and off nights. Nowadays, he's making some impessive feats live and that's why I'm expecting Luna Park so much.

Even after all the hardships James has been through, he has managed to get back on route to a great point. I actually saw Dream Theater live in Costa Rica (one week before the Luna Park concerts) and boy I was blown away, a great share of it because of James. I was with my brother, who is also a big fan but they're not his favorite band (so he doesn't listen to bootlegs or relatively minor releases), and he called James sounding "as good as in the 90s". I don't think he sounded like in the 90s, he sounded like he sounds right now. He's in a great moment. His voice is much more clean, the gritty tone from the 90s is not there, but he can hit the notes, sing his amazing vibratto, hold notes properly and so on.

[Tom Bombadil]

The first time I saw DT live was only 2 years ago, an I have to admit I was stunned by how good James sounded. He sounded much better than what I heard in Once in a Livetime and Live Scenes. I definitely think he's taken a better approach to his life performances because recently he's been fantastic

[Mosh]

Just for the record, and this can be reassured by any singing experts we got in this forum, there's no way to rasp your voice without damaging your vocal chords. Sure, you can minimize the damage, but you can't growl or rasp your voice to your heart's content without expecting any backlash at all.

Well, "damage" is a strong word... maybe "repercussion" fits better.

This. When you do that to your voice you cause your vocal chords to hit against each other rupturing them. Yes, it works if you use proper care, but the damage doesn't stop completely, and it happens faster than someone singing with a clean voice. I imagine James has a fragile voice since the Awake days and his food poisoning, it'd be best to avoid the raspiness altogether. Also, he didn't get vocal training until 2002ish right? I imagine had he not done all the vomiting, he would've wrecked his voice by then anyway. You can only sing like that without proper care for so long.

[Dark Castle]

Just for the record, as long as you do it properly, growling actually stresses your vocal chords less than singing.
Either way, I wanna hear James do what James wants, aside from ToT, I've always thought he sounds wonderful, so I'm not too worried

[Labrie1984]

James sounds dynamic and diverse in Impermanent Resonance. His voice is strong and mature now. I prefer his voice in DT though. I don't know why.

[Shadow Ninja 2.0]

Just for the record, as long as you do it properly, growling actually stresses your vocal chords less than singing.
Either way, I wanna hear James do what James wants, aside from ToT, I've always thought he sounds wonderful, so I'm not too worried

I think you're talking about actual growling, though, not just singing with a bit of rasp.

[DarkLord_Lalinc]

Just for the record, as long as you do it properly, growling actually stresses your vocal chords less than singing.
Either way, I wanna hear James do what James wants, aside from ToT, I've always thought he sounds wonderful, so I'm not too worried

Really? I'd like to learn more about that. You got any references? 

[liran95]

IMO, in the album studios James sounds amazing in all of them.
But live? I really think he'd lost something since Score era.

[wasteland]

IMO, in the album studios James sounds amazing in all of them.
But live? I really think he'd lost something since Score era.

God knows how much I disagree with you!

[adastra]

IMO, in the album studios James sounds amazing in all of them.
But live? I really think he'd lost something since Score era.

agreed! :3

[?]

IMO, in the album studios James sounds amazing in all of them.
But live? I really think he'd lost something since Score era.

God knows how much I disagree with you!

Don't worry, he'll probably change his mind when LALP comes out

[TheGreatPretender]

This. When you do that to your voice you cause your vocal chords to hit against each other rupturing them.

Some people are able to accomplish that using their false folds though, so their vocal cords aren't hitting against one another at all. Not everyone, it's a pretty tricky technique, but it is possible, and I wouldn't be surprised if that's what James is doing.

[wolven74]

IMO, in the album studios James sounds amazing in all of them.
But live? I really think he'd lost something since Score era.

I would agree with you on one hand. While stating that he's gained a lot of what he lost back since then on the other.

[Petruccinator12]

Almost 100 pages?! 

[ariich]

...I'm not in your list?

</3

Of course dude, I was just giving a few examples!

On the subject of James' singing, I like it when he tries different things with his voice, and includes bits of heavier singing styles. He pulls them off well and it makes the music sound more varied.

[?]

...I'm not in your list?

</3

Don't worry, I've always thought you're a native speaker!

I hope I'm in Rich's list as well

[Mladen]

I love LaBrie's rasp, hopefully there's quite a bit of it on DT12. 

[BlackInk]

oooorrrr... the album is going to come out and I am going to LOOOOOVE it. It's going to be either black or white. Love or Hate. I can feel it

I feel the opposite. I feel like I'm going to like it, but it won't be one of my favorites. It feels like this is going to be an okay DT album.