Dream Theater: The Astonishing (now with moment of betrayal!)

[MirrorMask]

My random attempt at guessing the songs:

1. Descent of the NOMACS -  non musical intro
2. Dystopian Overture - musical intro
3. The Gift of Music - first real song
4. The Answer / 5. A Better Life - one real song, one is an interlude, the first combo like Through My Words / Fatal Tragedy
6. Lord Nafaryus - Evil badass song
7. A Savior in the Square / 8. When Your Time Has Come - second possible combo, one is the intro one the "real" song
9. Act of Faythe / 10. Three Days - third possible combo
11. The Hovering Sojourn - instrumental
12. Brother, Can You Hear Me? - instrumental or even a very short, spoken interlude
13. A Life Left Behind - ballad
14. Ravenskill - instrumental that sets the "Ravenskill" theme
15. Chosen - crucial song
16. A Tempting Offer - instrumental, another short interlude
17. Digital Discord - instrumental, outro-ish

[liran95]

You know, speaking of The Theory of Everything got me an idea about these NOMACS icons:

In TTOE there are 4 major songs divided to many short tracks. But in the end, there are just 4 songs.
Maybe that's the case here:

Tracks 1-10 - Song one.
Tracks 11-16 - Song two.
Track 17-X (could be drifting to the 2nd disc) - Song three.

And so forth.

[Enigmachine]

Must say I was NOT prepared for this one!

Think of it guys,
Let's say the average song length in this act is about 3+- min.
17 tracks means at least 51 minutes.
Now let's be realistic for a moment - there WILL be tracks longer than 3 minutes.
I'd say the most logical possibility is something like 60 minutes (at least) of music per disc.
That means (by my own logic of course) that we're bound to get at least 120 minutes of new DT material (assuming, of course, that both discs are equal in their lengths).

OMG.

I think the discs may be reaching the limit of the CD space, so if that's 78 minutes, the average song length would be about 4 mins 34 seconds and 3 mins 32 seconds for an hour long album. Both numbers leave a reasonable amount of deviation one way or another so I think we could potentially get a few tracks reaching towards 10 mins (though a 12min+ song highly unlikely for Act One).

You know, speaking of The Theory of Everything got me an idea about these NOMACS icons:

In TTOE there are 4 major songs divided to many short tracks. But in the end, there are just 4 songs.
Maybe that's the case here:

Tracks 1-10 - Song one.
Tracks 11-16 - Song two.
Track 17-X (could be drifting to the 2nd disc) - Song three.

And so forth.

I would've thought that if they did that, the songs would surely be ordered in the chunks they revealed them. Like this sort of ordering.

1. Yearning
I. Descent of the NOMACS
II. Dystopian Overture
III. The Gift of Music
IV. The Answer
V. A Better Life

2. The Empire
I. Lord Nafaryus
II. A Savior in the Square
III. When Your Time Has Come
IV. Act of Faythe
V. Three Days
VI. The Hovering Sojourn

3. Rebellion is Rising
I. Brother, Can You Hear Me?
II. A Life Left Behind
III. Ravenskill
IV. Chosen
V. A Tempting Offer
VI. Digital Discord

I suppose if the NOMACS signal the start of a new batch your idea would make sense, but I would think that they may just indicate narration.

[Kotowboy]

You know, speaking of The Theory of Everything got me an idea about these NOMACS icons:

In TTOE there are 4 major songs divided to many short tracks. But in the end, there are just 4 songs.
Maybe that's the case here:

Tracks 1-10 - Song one.
Tracks 11-16 - Song two.
Track 17-X (could be drifting to the 2nd disc) - Song three.

And so forth.

Hey - as long as all 17 - 20 songs on each disc are selectable - i'm down.

[Train of Naught]

Cannot comprehend what's going on here, I'm not even going to guess anymore at this point lol

[Pax]

Those tracks with NOMAC symbols will be the sound of nomacs (cacophonous lull mentioned in the e-mail). Not instrumentals, not songs, just some sound effects getting more evil progressively, from track to track.

[liran95]

Cannot comprehend what's going on here, I'm not even going to guess anymore at this point lol

II think that's the cool part of all of it

We were all hoping for something different and unexpected.
Well, it's safe to say we don't have the slightest clue of what's going on!

[Kotowboy]

II

NUGGETZ

[Kotowboy]

So yeah - i'm guessing just for symmetry - there will be 20 tracks in ACT I

Either 20 tracks in ACT II as well or much less.

Could we be looking at a 40 track Double Album ? ! Is this real life ?!

[MirrorMask]

Cannot comprehend what's going on here, I'm not even going to guess anymore at this point lol

II think that's the cool part of all of it

We were all hoping for something different and unexpected.
Well, it's safe to say we don't have the slightest clue of what's going on!

Yeah, I love it! we're in for a mindfuck of an album 

[liran95]

II

NUGGETZ

Mistyped, but... Yeah, why not?

NUGGETZ CONFIRMED.

[jdprsaga]

Wow.. I wasn't expecting that!!! I would guess some of those tracks could be spoken/sound effects not topping the 1 minute mark.

[pdurbin22]

Yeah, I love it! we're in for a mindfuck of an album 
[/quote]

That is exactly what I'm hoping for! These are five super-smart guys and I always liked DT best when their lyrics and concepts challenged me. I mean, their music always makes me feel like an idiot...

[jdprsaga]

I would've thought that if they did that, the songs would surely be ordered in the chunks they revealed them. Like this sort of ordering.

1. Yearning
I. Descent of the NOMACS
II. Dystopian Overture
III. The Gift of Music
IV. The Answer
V. A Better Life

2. The Empire
I. Lord Nafaryus
II. A Savior in the Square
III. When Your Time Has Come
IV. Act of Faythe
V. Three Days
VI. The Hovering Sojourn

3. Rebellion is Rising
I. Brother, Can You Hear Me?
II. A Life Left Behind
III. Ravenskill
IV. Chosen
V. A Tempting Offer
VI. Digital Discord

[/size]

Make sense

[Kotowboy]

Descent of the NOMACS

The Hovering Soujorn

Digital Discord




Yeah they definitely sound like brief segue titles.

[Zook]

A Dream Theater Power Metal album.


I dig.

[SuperTaco]

My excitement keeps building with every bit of info released This one might be really special.

[Kotowboy]

I think even the people who expected something a bit out of left-field this time around didn't expect THIS ! 

So Kudos to DT for doing something completely out of the blue.

[ariich]

Well, that was genuinely unexpected.

Cool!

[Kotowboy]

I'm thinking either Act II has the same amount of tracks OR it's a much shorter disc overall. Like Porcupine Tree's The Incident.

[James.v6]

    

Ohh God. Guys worked really hard.
Its going to be ehmm ..EPIC..

[Kotowboy]

Fast forward to November 2016 :



" What if The Astonishing was one Album ? "

[paulstfu]

Cannot comprehend what's going on here, I'm not even going to guess anymore at this point lol

THIS. Even if I wanted to guess a little more, it's not possible 

No one saw THAT coming. Everyone was guessing what would have been obvious in a double album scenario: 10 songs (maybe 1 or 2 more on CD2) in each CD with songs between 3 - 10 minutes. But now, the band is confirming this is an unexpected album

[Progmetty]

shit ton of spoken word over keyboard atmospheric music, are what at least half these tracks are IMHO.

[AngelBack]

Well that was a dramatic......thing.

[Lucien]

holy fuck

like

what

This first CD has more tracks on it than any DT record, and it's the FIRST CD

[Lucien]

Speculation:

We're going to have a single from both CDs, each released sometime after each CD's tracklist is complete

[Kotowboy]

holy fuck

like

what

This first CD has more tracks on it than any DT record, and it's the FIRST CD

[RMGadelha]

Speculation:

We're going to have a single from both CDs, each released sometime after each CD's tracklist is complete

That would mean a new track in 3 or 4 days! I highly doubt though, unfortunately.

[fadetoblackdude7]

This is officially getting out of hand......BUT I LOVE IT!!!

[CDrice]

The faythe I have in this album keeps increasing at every updates.

[Lucien]

Speculation:

big text

That would mean a new track in 3 or 4 days! I highly doubt though, unfortunately.

Yeah, I doubt it too. I don't think they're done with the record.

[Kotowboy]

They started mixing on October 13. That was pretty much a month ago.


It looks like a long record but i'd imagine they're done mixing it and possibly mastering too.

[YtseJohn]

What if there were no physical CD's and it's a digital only release...

[Zook]

What if there were no physial CD's and it's a digital only release...

I'd hate that immensely.