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

[erwinrafael]

Am I only one who heard some sort of reference to The Gift of Music in the guitar solo of Moment of Betrayal? That chord transition around 4:19 really sounds like the one around 2:31 of TGOM.

Maybe I am just reading too much into it. 

[CoT67]

I enjoy MM's work more on this album so far probably because there's less room for him to overdo it. The major reason I don't like MOB that much though is I find the pre-chorus annoying, which is in large part due to the drums.

So you're referring specifically to when he do his machine-gun drums thing?

Yeah, it's all the snare. It would need more dynamics and/or additional drums to work for me. It doesn't hold the section together enough given the rhythm of what the rest of the band is doing.
Just imo obviously. No problem at all with MM on TA so far other than that. I'm feeling a lot more of the classic DT vibe from his playing.

Yeah. Among his repertoire, that's one that does get tiring if overdone. I like it when he does it in spurts. Surprisingly, I like it in The Enemy Inside. Maybe because in that song he is doing it with one hand and mixing up other interesting tidbits with his other hand. 

I love the drumming on TEI but I agree that on MOB that there's some stuff going on that doesn't really fit.  Not enough to really annoy me but noticeable.

Other than that I am liking it - unfortunately the better sound quality doesn't alter the awful rhythm guitar tone (lead is beautiful as usual). Funnily enough I find JP's album rhythm tone is way too thick/muddy (this and Dt12) and live ......way too tinny

Regarding the rhythm guitar tone, there's an interview of Petrucci talking about his DT12 tone that I posted on the JP signature amp thread... he said he left the whole processing to Chycki that EQ'd it quite heavily, while in the past JP always tried to get the sound as raw as possible in the mix, working more with mics and room ambience instead of post processing. It feels too smooth and not a "real" tone, if you ask me, compared for example to the one in ADToE.

I'm pretty sure they did almost the same thing this time, but I guess it was done to help mix together so many different instruments... the whole mix's balance is better than a single instrument's tone I presume.

[Nefarius]

Maybe I am just reading too much into it. 

DTF, so no.

Greetings...
Nef

[TioJorge]

Really diggin' this track. I can't say I heard anything wrong with the drums but then again unless there is either something really legendary or really horrific with them, I usually don't notice. I haven't been utterly blown away by Mangini but I can say he's a really great fit for DT and that he's done a fine job thus far. It also might simply be that this track called for a more mellow and simple beat driven drum track. There are very few drummers out there that I've taken notice to and most often it's their imaginative use of their kit, not the mere beats per second or how 'much' they drum but rather what kind of ambiance they add atop their obvious role of keeping things centered. Mangini does that quite well.

I'm excited for the album though. I haven't had a good listen to any kind of conceptual piece in a long while so I'm all for this. They're not my first choice in albums and traditionally I very rarely listen to them given the album-centric necessities and my song/random playlist orientation but with how vast and deep this album seems, I'm totally down to dive into this uber nerd fest of awesomeness and hear the lore of the war.

DEM EYEBALLS DOE.

[MacClaus]

German Review...
https://powermetal.de/review/review-Dream_Theater/The_Astonishing,27540.html

another one...
https://www.metalwani.com/2016/01/review-dream-theater-the-astonishing.html

[Nefarius]

For my ears Moment Of Betrayal recorded from a radio show and uploaded to YouTube still sounded nicer than most of DT12 in its original CD quality. I remember complaining about the The Enemy Inside online premiere during the last album cycle and how fatiguing I felt it was. The CD wasn't much better.

Both The Gift Of Music and Moment Of Betrayal made me hit the replay button immediately and both songs got better and better every time. That's the Dream Theater experience I like: Positive confusion the first time I hear it and coming back again and again for more details and awesomeness.

Greetings...
Nef

[The Hairy Man]

I was very surprised to hear TGOM on the radio in the car last night!!

Not sure if mentioned earlier but the radio guy was also plugging his show "One Man and his Prog" for this weekend Sunday @ midnight on Planet Rock - 3/5 of Dream Theater there to promote and discuss The Astonishing. Not sure if it is a new interview or just a re-hash of a generic one out there already - either way the show should probably be available to listen to at your leisure after the event on the Planet Rock website.

[Bertielee]

For my ears Moment Of Betrayal recorded from a radio show and uploaded to YouTube still sounded nicer than most of DT12 in its original CD quality. I remember complaining about the The Enemy Inside online premiere during the last album cycle and how fatiguing I felt it was. The CD wasn't much better.

Both The Gift Of Music and Moment Of Betrayal made me hit the replay button immediately and both songs got better and better every time. That's the Dream Theater experience I like: Positive confusion the first time I hear it and coming back again and again for more details and awesomeness.

Greetings...
Nef

Well, Nef, that's me in a nutshell!

B.Lee

[Vandalism]

+1 

[Train of Naught]

I'm liking this song much better now that it's released officialy with proper quality.

That intro already blew me away on first listen but it's even better now! It's so damn beautiful.

[wolfking]

New song is solid.

[vazquez]

German Review...
https://powermetal.de/review/review-Dream_Theater/The_Astonishing,27540.html

As far as my German go, I could see three main points:

1. The album is different from others.
2. Labrie is amazing.
3. The critic wouldn´t place this album among his favorites from DT, but he confess the album is too complex to judge in a couple spins, and it´s a grower.

[RoeDent]

The most common things among the reviews so far seem to be: how different the album is from past DT albums, and praising James LaBrie's vocal performance.

[MirrorMask]

The first was kinda a given, since this is a rock opera... I'm excited that everyone agree that James is amazing on this one!!!!

[escruting]

The most common things among the reviews so far seem to be: how different the album is from past DT albums, and praising James LaBrie's vocal performance.

Hearing Labrie's voice on MoB i find that he's forcing too much out of his comfortable range. Hes forces too much and i think the voice loses strength.

I was listening to Haken's Visions (album) and Hand Cannot Erase and remembered how nice it is to hear a clean and strong vocal performance.

We all know that Labrie forces himself even more when playing live, so, i'm a bit worried. Spent 180€ to go to Italy and see them and i'm a bit concerned about the vocal output of this album.

[wolven74]

At first listen I liked TGOM better than MOB... But the more I listen to it (especially with the billboard stream) I think MOB is just as open as TGOM. The vocals were harder to understand the first spin, but the more I hear it the easier they are to understand. I love the odd time signature after the first chorus. It's almost dissonant, which is so different it's killer. The work Mangini does on these two tracks is stellar. Both tracks bode very well for the whole album.

[rumborak]

German Review...
https://powermetal.de/review/review-Dream_Theater/The_Astonishing,27540.html

As far as my German go, I could see three main points:

1. The album is different from others.
2. Labrie is amazing.
3. The critic wouldn´t place this album among his favorites from DT, but he confess the album is too complex to judge in a couple spins, and it´s a grower.

I kinda had the impression the guy was holding back.

[rab7]

I love the odd time signature after the first chorus. It's almost dissonant, which is so different it's killer.

The cool thing is, that's actually 4/4 the whole way through, but in "Never leave a man behind", they subdivide it differently. Not sure what the musical term for it is, but the entire verse is in 4/4.

[shadow1psc]

I love the odd time signature after the first chorus. It's almost dissonant, which is so different it's killer.

The cool thing is, that's actually 4/4 the whole way through, but in "Never leave a man behind", they subdivide it differently. Not sure what the musical term for it is, but the entire verse is in 4/4.

Jordan does this a lot in the band - he'll subdivide a part into two different time signatures, sometimes even by left and right hand to create interesting juxtapositions while the band sticks to a more uniform time signature. I'm trying to think of an example, but it's too early. Maybe Outcry.

[Kotowboy]

CIAW? Filler???  What the what???

Yeah, it and Innocence Faded are my two least favorite songs on the album. Cut those two and I think you have a much better album overall. In my opinion.

Nope. Awake's first 3 songs are the best 3.

The album bores me after that.

[Pax]

In my opinion, MOB is a nice track, the middle instrumental part reminds me of Outcry, and I love it, I also love that moment after the second chorus (before the instrumental), goes something like "heee will beeee defeeenseless", beautiful vocal melody in that part

However, the chorus annoys me a bit, especially because it appears THREE times (and twice would be completely enough). But there's no much repetition in TGOM.
Also, that TGOM ending riff, reminiscent of Blind Faith, and JP/JR solo after that riff , those parts really cuddle my soul and warm my heart, I can just lie back, relax and enjoy those parts with a big smile on my face.
So, overall, I'd say TGOM is just a little bit better for me than MOB (maybe because I'm happy to hear that SDOIT vibe once again, lol). Nevertheless, both songs make me look forward to the album, and if qualities of those songs are really below the album average quality like you guys say, this will most probably be in top 3 of my all-time favourite DT albums.

[TAC]

CIAW? Filler???  What the what???

Yeah, it and Innocence Faded are my two least favorite songs on the album. Cut those two and I think you have a much better album overall. In my opinion.

Nope. Awake's first 3 songs are the best 3.

The album bores me after that.

Wow.

[Gappie]

CIAW? Filler???  What the what???

Yeah, it and Innocence Faded are my two least favorite songs on the album. Cut those two and I think you have a much better album overall. In my opinion.

Nope. Awake's first 3 songs are the best 3.

The album bores me after that.

Seriously? how come?

[Evermind]

CIAW? Filler???  What the what???

Yeah, it and Innocence Faded are my two least favorite songs on the album. Cut those two and I think you have a much better album overall. In my opinion.

Nope. Awake's first 3 songs are the worst 3.

The album is outstanding after that.

FTFM

[Bertie_Wooster]

6:00 is about the only DT song that I consider horrible.

[efx]

CIAW? Filler???  What the what???

Yeah, it and Innocence Faded are my two least favorite songs on the album. Cut those two and I think you have a much better album overall. In my opinion.

Nope. Awake's first 3 songs are the best 3.

The album bores me after that.

I'm not quite there with it but I do think that 6:00 and Innocence Faded are much better songs than say Voices and LSOAD though I still like the latter very much. The highs on that album are superb and some of the best work they've ever done but it's a very uneven album to me.

[Bertie_Wooster]

in what universe is 6:00 better than voices?   

[Lucien]

in what universe is 6:00 better than voices?   

Someone else's subjective, valid opinion.

[Fritzinger]

Wow you guys are crazy. Whenever I have one day full of lectures and rehearsals, I need one and a half hours to read through the 37 million new posts in this thread. And whenever I klick "reply", I get the message, that another 2 million posts were written while I was reading this page

Anyway, concerning the Circus Maximus song (yeah I'm sooo las week), I think the drums sound nothing like The Astonishing. More like Haken, at least the snare. The toms don't sound awesome, but they don't bother me. All in all a really good song! I really like this band but I'm not so much into the singers voice. Does anyone else have the feeling that there are similarities between The Weight's chorus and the one in Breaking All Illusions ("Searching out, reaching in...")?

I still have not listened to MoB, and it's killing me. It's killing me. Really.

[Enigmachine]

Anyway, concerning the Circus Maximus song (yeah I'm sooo las week), I think the drums sound nothing like The Astonishing. More like Haken, at least the snare. The toms don't sound awesome, but they don't bother me. All in all a really good song! I really like this band but I'm not so much into the singers voice. Does anyone else have the feeling that there are similarities between The Weight's chorus and the one in Breaking All Illusions ("Searching out, reaching in...")?

IIRC, the song 'Last Goodbye' off of the last CM album Nine had a similar chorus and is kind of like a longer and more proggy version of 'The Weight'.

[Fritzinger]

Anyway, concerning the Circus Maximus song (yeah I'm sooo las week), I think the drums sound nothing like The Astonishing. More like Haken, at least the snare. The toms don't sound awesome, but they don't bother me. All in all a really good song! I really like this band but I'm not so much into the singers voice. Does anyone else have the feeling that there are similarities between The Weight's chorus and the one in Breaking All Illusions ("Searching out, reaching in...")?

IIRC, the song 'Last Goodbye' off of the last CM album Nine had a similar chorus and is kind of like a longer and more proggy version of 'The Weight'.

Honestly have to say, that the first album by CM is the only one I really checked out, the second one I heard about 9-10 times, maybe. I haven't heard Nine, but I am listening to Last Goodbye now.
What does IIRC mean?

[Crow]

Listening to this now for the first time. I don't like how processed the heavy guitars sound. Youtube could be responsible for that, I'm sure, but.
Also apparently people are complaining about the prechorus? I dunno I liked the frantic drumming there, it creates a good sense of buildup.

...the chorus feels really weak though 

Man, I wish Rudess would get better patches. His synthstrings still sound awful here.
Petrucci's phrasing in his solo is so strange, it feels like a lot of different ideas awkwardly patched together. I'll like a 2-measure section then not really like the next one at all.

...I was already not that hyped for this album but this isn't helping 

[Train of Naught]

I dunno I liked the frantic drumming there, it creates a good sense of buildup.

[Crow]

i have no clue what you're trying to imply with that

[mikeyd23]

Man, I wish Rudess would get better patches. His synthstrings still sound awful here.

I'm pretty sure JR said in an interview that he mostly played piano and organ on the album, so when you hear strings, that's an orchestra playing, not JR...