A friend of mine doubted that The Similitude Of A Dream could be better than The Astonishing. Hearing MPs big announcements, he said "MP isn't seriously comparing Gillette with Petrucci, Hubauer with Rudess and George with Myung???". In the end, you can hear much more Randy George on Similitude than you can hear Myung on The Astonishing. Myung is an insane player and he has my deepest , but he could be a little more creative and present in the band. I know he's a quiet guy, and that's cool. But why play the greatest lines and freakiest shit if nobody hears it? We haven't had a bass solo in years, no chapman stick, no double bass (not the drum). Levin is more present imho. His groove and tone is amazing.
As a bass player myself, anyone would thing I listen to DT because of the bass lines and all JM does, but when I was first introduced to the band, what hooked me was the amazing job JP, JR and MP were doing.All the complexity and writing. With the years, I can appreciate much more what JM does, but he is often buried on the mix, and that sucks for him, because he's playing AMAZING stuff.
On TA he's almost inaudible, while on DT12 he was very prominent and you could notice his bass lines are unreal (Surrender to Reason, anyone?)
All he needs is to be higher on the mix and bettee production for his sound. Also, he sounded much better with his old Yamaha from FII and SFAM, I never really liked the tone of his Bongo basses
+1 on him using more his Chapman Stick. Also, he hasn't used a fretless on a DT song since Through Her Eyes