*Official* The Astonishing discussion thread

[KevShmev]

I am perfectly fine with JLB doing all of the vocals and characters.  Given that he has appeared on an Ayreon album, having different vocalists for each character would have given it too much of a feel like that project.

Which is why I suggested DT not release it under the DT banner in my original post that was only partially quoted.  If it was only two or three characters, ok.  But eight is too many to distinguish.  That's a big reason Ayreon and Avantasia are so digestable.

Okay, but this IS a Dream Theater record .  It is written and performed by Dream Theater, so releasing it under a different name, just because some guest vocalists, would be kinda goofy, if you ask me.

[KevShmev]

Also, I noticed a drop-off in quality in Act 2 on my first listen, almost like it reached the point of tedium since the songs all seemed to have a similar vibe, but we'll see if I still think after a few more listens (which only takes many more hours ).  I disagree with anyone who says this album doesn't have songs, though.  Tons of really good ones in Act 1.

[chego_voice]

The third arrives...

Before the leaves have fallen
Before we lock the doors
There must be a third and last dance
This one will last forever
Metropolis watches and thoughtfully smiles
She's taken you to your home

It can only take place
When the struggle between our children has ended
Now the miracle and the sleeper know that the third is love

Love is the dance of eternity

...sounds very Astonishing for me

[Freeze]

Three listenings in , and I feel pretty sure this is DT's best album since SFAM in my opinion. Lots of music still to sink in , but I feel this is a album I really want to hear again after the record is over. The production is really good as well. Very well done overall I think. I'm really looking forward to see this album performed live here in Norway at the end of next month.

[Enigmachine]

So after my first listen, I thought the album was great (and one of the best sounding DT albums), but very difficult to compare to the other DT albums due to how different this really is for them. I was quite impressed at how every single piece was distinct and neccesary, though I would've liked longer tracks with multiple plot points progressing through dynamic ~10 min songs that work better on their own than something like 'A Tempting Offer', which is well executed but too short IMO. Also, I'd rather they'd left the sound effects out completely and let the music itself interpret them. Even if I think SfaM works better at this stage due to a hightened tension and energy as well as a more symbolic story, TA works in its own Rock Opera way. My dad was a bit disappointed though, he's more of a metalhead and you can imagine that he wasn't really catered to on this album, but he did respect the effort that went into it.

[mc7]

Just started listening to the The Astonishing download - the CD has not yet arrived! Straight out of the blocks it is awesome with the Dystopian Overture (one of the best DT album intros). 1:46 - 2:00 = an incredible feat in sound mixing, imo 

[ZKX-2099]

Yeah the album is awesome. It complements a great mood as well. Great happy music.

[commanderbob]

This is a musically sad day. New Dream Theater Day has always been like a major holiday for me and very exciting to listen to the album in full with headphones on or in the car, nice and loud. It's been this way for over 20 years. This is the first one that's come along that's just sort of........meh. The frustrating thing are that there MOMENTS of absolute brilliance in every track, and James is literally the best I've ever heard him sing, but it just doesn't fit together very well. And I don't think that the story is very interesting, or told very compellingly. I'm sure that after a few listens that a few tracks will stand out, like Moment of Betrayal and the Gift of Music. But mostly the vocal lines are too ponderous and obvious to me, and there is a LOT of singing.

So in total, a sad musical day for me. Many moment of the usual utter brilliance, but to reference Lord of the Rings, it's too little butter scraped over too much bread. In future concerts, I would certainly enjoy a 15 minute suite of all of the great stuff played together.

[King Postwhore]

I would rather see DT try something different than do what everybody wants DT to do.  People are so self important when it comes to their career. I hope their continue to strive for different.

[Marion Crane]

I like the link with all of the song descriptions, but in there somewhere online I can see all of the lyrics?

[Zydar]

I like the link with all of the song descriptions, but in there somewhere online I can see all of the lyrics?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bw98b2EOpWbQb3BoRzZWOE5QNFU/view

[Marion Crane]

Awesome thanks!

[BlobVanDam]

I would rather see DT try something different than do what everybody wants DT to do.  People are so self important when it comes to their career. I hope their continue to strive for different.

While it's looking more likely this isn't going to rank highly for me overall, I'm still happy they got so invested in an idea and did something very different for themselves.
The songs I like, I love, and can see myself listening to in future unlike anything from ADTOE and DT12, because they're different and unique. And sure, there are plenty of misses for me, but when you do something different, you're not going to please everyone. I'm fine with that. I hope that come next album, they continue to evolve and try new ideas, and maybe those ones will be more to my tastes.
But I won't criticize them for doing what they want and keeping it fresh.

[rab7]

I am perfectly fine with JLB doing all of the vocals and characters.  Given that he has appeared on an Ayreon album, having different vocalists for each character would have given it too much of a feel like that project.

Which is why I suggested DT not release it under the DT banner in my original post that was only partially quoted.  If it was only two or three characters, ok.  But eight is too many to distinguish.  That's a big reason Ayreon and Avantasia are so digestable.

You keep saying eight, but it's actually six, because one is dead and has no lines, while the other has 4 lines and it's all screaming. The only problems I have are distinguishing Daryus/Nafaryus, and figuring out when Arabelle is talking

[commanderbob]

I forgot to mention in my previous comments, that regardless of my opinion of the entire album, Our New World is utter perfection from beginning to end and easily fits into the Pantheon Of Great Dream Theater Songs.

[senecadawg2]

I feel like it hasn't been discussed as much as some other songs (New Beginning, Three Days, Act of Faythe and Our New World in particular), but surely I'm not the only one really fond of A Better Life. One of the stronger vocal performances, in my opinion, and probably my favorite song overall so far.

[metrojam]

I would rather see DT try something different than do what everybody wants DT to do.  People are so self important when it comes to their career. I hope their continue to strive for different.

While it's looking more likely this isn't going to rank highly for me overall, I'm still happy they got so invested in an idea and did something very different for themselves.
The songs I like, I love, and can see myself listening to in future unlike anything from ADTOE and DT12, because they're different and unique. And sure, there are plenty of misses for me, but when you do something different, you're not going to please everyone. I'm fine with that. I hope that come next album, they continue to evolve and try new ideas, and maybe those ones will be more to my tastes.
But I won't criticize them for doing what they want and keeping it fresh.

Very good and sensible post, to which I concur totally. TA really isn't going to rank very high at all with me either as it is too lightweight for my preferences and as for that damn piano!!!...................BUT as I have also said, full marks to the band for doing something different and something they clearly wanted to do and I hope it is a success for them. I'm sure that a lot of people are going to really like it and as for the likes of me and others who aren't so keen, we will just have to wait another couple of years or so until the next one and hope its more to our liking when it comes out.

[fischermasamune]

In which moments can I hear Richard Chycki's speaking as Lord Nafaryus?

[BlobVanDam]

In which moments can I hear Richard Chycki's speaking as Lord Nafaryus?

Where was this mentioned?

[chego_voice]

so... nobody hear SFAM references?..


...OK!

(Slam the door)

[Progmetty]

I used that google drive link last night to read the lyrics on my first spin through the album, very helpful, especially since some douche glued my booklet to the CD case..
I thought the album went from too tense to too happy after Arhys died, I sorta excepted a bitter sweet ending where liberation does come but with more sacrifices and blood, I wonder if JP made a conscience decision to keep it PG13ish.
I did shed a tear when Arhys died though. Up until he died, especially after planning to give up Gabriel, I thought a big reveal might be a Metropolis connection but there definitely isn't a connection IMO.

[MirrorMask]

Finally heard it! Dystopian Overture was great, familiar DT territory introducing all the themes, The Gift of Music set the mood already for the story that is to come... So much melody, so many awesome moments from James, I totally love the approach they had with the style of the album! At first I didn't feel the burden of the many slow songs, then after a bit the listening experience was getting a bit hard since there is too much to absorb in one sitting... but well, that's what repeated listenings are for 

The first impression is very good, it didn't blow me away as the first listening of SFAM did but I'm confident this will happen when I will finally have gotten my head around the whole enormous body of work. I'm happy DT wanted to do something so grandiose and daring! 

[Progmetty]

In which moments can I hear Richard Chycki's speaking as Lord Nafaryus?

Where was this mentioned?

The booklet, but I didn't notice it while listening.

[goo-goo]

In which moments can I hear Richard Chycki's speaking as Lord Nafaryus?

Where was this mentioned?

Booklet, on the credits

EDIT: Ninaj'd/Myung'd 

[KevShmev]

I admittedly glossed over quite a few pages of this thread - too many to go through once I got home last night - but does anyone absolutely adore The Answer?  That is one of the best songs under two minutes I've ever heard.  Gorgeous little piece of music.

[chrisbDTM]

Listening to the album became very tedious for me at times. Way too many James/Jordan interludes for me. There are parts I like very much but I felt like I there's a lot of time in between those parts

[BlobVanDam]

In which moments can I hear Richard Chycki's speaking as Lord Nafaryus?

Where was this mentioned?

The booklet, but I didn't notice it while listening.

Ah cool. If it's what I'm thinking, it's not on the album.

Given that the album is so close to the maximum length of a CD, does anyone else suspect they may have had to trim to get it down to length? I wonder if the outro solo of A New Beginning got faded out out of necessity? Maybe it's nothing.

[senecadawg2]

I admittedly glossed over quite a few pages of this thread - too many to go through once I got home last night - but does anyone absolutely adore The Answer?  That is one of the best songs under two minutes I've ever heard.  Gorgeous little piece of music.

Agreed. Less is more, in this case.

[Progmetty]

Yeah that's what someone was saying in the New Beginning thread, valid reason to trim except there were other places they could have trimmed IMO, they picked on the few "rockin'" moments to trim..

[BlobVanDam]

Yeah that's what someone was saying in the New Beginning thread, valid reason to trim except there were other places they could have trimmed IMO, they picked on the few "rockin'" moments to trim..

While it was rockin', it also wasn't absolutely necessary, as a lot of other moments were. It's like cutting a movie. While a scene may be a cool moment, if it's not necessary to tell the overall story, it's one of the first to go. It's just so close to 80 minutes that I reckon they had to trim a second here and there to the maximum they were allowed.

[KevShmev]

I admittedly glossed over quite a few pages of this thread - too many to go through once I got home last night - but does anyone absolutely adore The Answer?  That is one of the best songs under two minutes I've ever heard.  Gorgeous little piece of music.

Agreed. Less is more, in this case.

For sure. And I love the fact that the songs actually begins and ends, instead of segueing from or to another song, making it a great standalone song. 

Edit: I guess it technically it does segue into A Better Life, but that is more of a crossfade than an actual segue.  I think y'all know what I mean.

[Kotowboy]

It's like Metallica fading out The Outlaw Torn on Load because it went over 80 minutes by 30 seconds.

[lovethedrake]

The one elephant in the room here is that the ballads and slow songs are often just not very good......   if there were a bunch of "beneath the Surfaces, Waits for sleep, Anna Lees, or Dissappear's I don't think people would be complaining quite as much.    They really do often come off as filler and just a means to tell the story.  Although i do think a true metalhead would really struggle with this album regardless of how good the ballads were.

Its tough to stomach a 55 year old man singing disney songs despite how beautiful many of them are.   I wish they would have gone for less sappy and more mystical on their ballads.

Going through the tracklist this could have been a spectacular 15 track album.   

So that means we got about 15 great new DT songs so I am ecstatic but overall it sounds like a 34 song album that needed to be edited down a bit.

With all that said I have it ranked around 5th for DT which means it dethrones FII and I NEVER thought any of the classic era DT albums would get dethroned.  So despite some of my complaints I am a truly satisfied customer and fan.

[V_R11]

Also, I noticed a drop-off in quality in Act 2 on my first listen, almost like it reached the point of tedium since the songs all seemed to have a similar vibe, but we'll see if I still think after a few more listens (which only takes many more hours ).  I disagree with anyone who says this album doesn't have songs, though.  Tons of really good ones in Act 1.

My thoughts exactly. Act 2 is growing on me though. Also, I love JLB and I'm fine with him doing all the vocals but I just can't hear him changing characters. At all.

[KevShmev]

 

Going through the tracklist this could have been a spectacular 15 track album.   

So that means we got about 15 great new DT songs so I am ecstatic but overall it sounds like a 34 song album that needed to be edited down a bit.
 

After two listens now, I think I agree with this.  It's just so damn long, and I thought the middle of Act 2 was a bit tedious. Nothing that was bad at all, but there is a little run of songs that just seem kind of there (beginning with The Walking Shadow).  Most of Act 1 seems pretty great and Act 2 does have a few standouts.  That is my thought process right now.