Sons of Apollo (feat. Portnoy & Sherinian)

[Adami]

But by that logic, we're never allowed to criticize any artist for any reason, as long as they like what they did.

I mean, I get that logic, but man would that make life boring.

[ytserush]

Listening to this somewhat regularly for about a week and it's probably in the 4-5-6 range.

Bought the instrumental version because I'm not a Soto fan (Still haven't listened to that though.)

It is what it is.

It's kind of grown on me a bit though and Soto's voice isn't as bad I thought it might be. Least faves so far are Sign Of The Time, Labyrinth (Though I see what they did there.) and Alive. The rest of it isn't bad, but I can't see it resonating for very long. 

Not going to see them live. Want to wait to see what the next album is like. I really think they played it safe with this one which I suppose is kind of what they needed to do to get an album out before the tour.

At some point I'll give the instrumental disc a spin and see what happens. That was the insurance policy.

[ytserush]

Winery Dogs was pushed pretty hard by Eddie Trunk. Probably didn't make the difference of 8,000 copies but I'm sure it helped. In general the album was better promoted I thought. I'm still not really sure who the audience of SoA was supposed to be.

I see no reason while he wouldn't do the same for this one. A lot of it is radio friendly.

[ytserush]

But by that logic, we're never allowed to criticize any artist for any reason, as long as they like what they did.

I mean, I get that logic, but man would that make life boring.

Criticize away then....

[Adami]

But by that logic, we're never allowed to criticize any artist for any reason, as long as they like what they did.

I mean, I get that logic, but man would that make life boring.

Criticize away then....

Hmmm......yo mama's so fat, when she sits on a rainbow, skittles pop out.

[Anguyen92]

Winery Dogs was pushed pretty hard by Eddie Trunk. Probably didn't make the difference of 8,000 copies but I'm sure it helped. In general the album was better promoted I thought. I'm still not really sure who the audience of SoA was supposed to be.

I see no reason while he wouldn't do the same for this one. A lot of it is radio friendly.

The problem is that while it is "radio friendly," which I do not think it is imo, there are plenty of bands out there have a radio friendly sound and not only that, they look to be a lot more marketable than the prospects of Sons of Apollo, I feel.  I mean the market is so oversaturated with radio-friendly bands and they are so much younger than SOA.

[Mosh]

Winery Dogs was pushed pretty hard by Eddie Trunk. Probably didn't make the difference of 8,000 copies but I'm sure it helped. In general the album was better promoted I thought. I'm still not really sure who the audience of SoA was supposed to be.

I see no reason while he wouldn't do the same for this one. A lot of it is radio friendly.

Well Trunk also had a hand in Winery Dog's formation (I think he recommended Kotzen or something) so that was part of it.

I have a hard time calling SoA radio friendly. Some of it was certainly written with that intention but I'm not sure what radio station (terrestrial or satellite) would be interested in playing it. It's too proggy for the straight forward rock crowd and too straight forward for the prog crowd. There's a happy medium of course (just ask Rush) but Sons of Apollo seems kinda sloppily put together. Don't get me wrong, I thought the album was fine, but like I said I'm really not sure what they were going for. In the end it's probably going to only attract a small fraction of an already niche audience.

[Adami]

The difference is Rush is legacy. They were popular on the radio in a different era, and now they're on oldies and classic rock station because of their legacy.


SoA don't have any of that working in their favor. Also, catchy vocals doesn't equal radio friendly.

[Mosh]

Very true, but that also shaped their musical development. Check out Rush in the early 80's talking about how much they liked The Police, that was the sort of thing that was popular at the time. They were absorbing what was going on around them. Everything about Rush is natural and of its time. Everything about SoA is just middle of the road and contrived.

I definitely don't consider SoA radio friendly.

[shadystraz360]

I heavily enjoyed the album. I thought it realy rocked and showed why DT shouldn't have lost both Derek & Mike...
2 greats teaming up to do what they do best...

[Anguyen92]

I heavily enjoyed the album. I thought it realy rocked and showed why DT shouldn't have lost both Derek & Mike...
2 greats teaming up to do what they do best...

Honestly, given what DT's done without them, I'm not seeing why they need either Derek or Mike so yeah.

[SwedishGoose]

I heavily enjoyed the album. I thought it realy rocked and showed why DT shouldn't have lost both Derek & Mike...
2 greats teaming up to do what they do best...

Honestly, given what DT's done without them, I'm not seeing why they need either Derek or Mike so yeah.

There is not one DT album that I rank lower than Psycotic Symphony so if that is the measurement then it was good that DT lost both.

Having said that I think they are both very good contributors but they need someone who is a strong songwriter to work with (example Petrucci, Morse, Donati).

[NoseofNicko]

There is not one DT album that I rank lower than Psychotic Symphony

+1

[ganpondorodf]

Winery Dogs was pushed pretty hard by Eddie Trunk. Probably didn't make the difference of 8,000 copies but I'm sure it helped. In general the album was better promoted I thought. I'm still not really sure who the audience of SoA was supposed to be.

DT fans, at least until Portnoy and Sherinian decided to alienate them for some reason

[MirrorMask]

Happy birthday to Jeff Scott Soto!!!  born the same day as Jordan!

[Anguyen92]

Winery Dogs was pushed pretty hard by Eddie Trunk. Probably didn't make the difference of 8,000 copies but I'm sure it helped. In general the album was better promoted I thought. I'm still not really sure who the audience of SoA was supposed to be.

DT fans, at least until Portnoy and Sherinian decided to alienate them for some reason

Well, I think the audience of SoA would be those that would prefer the heavier (TOT-style) side of DT, especially given the direction of The Astonishing was not for everyone and people probably want a good alternative to that.  I personally thought in Mike and Derek's attempts to reach for that audience, I felt they took it a bit far with taking shots at The Astonishing (it may not be for everyone's taste but it was still a pretty creative album), taking shots at Jordan, and I was quite unamused when Mike took a shot at DTF and then close his own forum.

I think they could have done a lot of better in terms of the promotion.  You want to reach a good diversity of an audience.  People that love The Astonishing could still like something like SoA if you welcome them in, but I did not see that happening.

[MirrorMask]

Well, it's not all black and white, I love a lot The Astonishing, and still I quite like Psychotic Symphony, so it's not that only those who didn't like The Astonishing could find something to like in their album (something that they should have figured out honestly).

[ErHaO]

To chime in on one of the discussion above, I don't think Sons of Apollo is radio friendly to be honest, for the most part. Winery Dogs and (especially the first album of) Flying Colors were.

Also, I wonder what kind of tiny clubs he refers to in regards of Amob, as the venues of many of his other projects aren't that big either (over here). DT is probably the biggest prog metal band, at least here. Maybe Opeth draws similar crowds, I don't know. But 99% of the more well known artists in the prog metal genre plays small venues here. There are artists that have some prog metal in it that are relatively popular, but dedicated prog metal just isn't that big of a market.

[mikeyd23]

Wow, so they only moved 5,200 copies in the first week? Maybe that marketing strategy didn’t go over so well.

Also, in terms of radio play, I don’t see anything on this record becoming a big FM radio rock hit. A band of dudes in there 50s and 60s playing middle of the road prog metal isn’t exactly a receipt for “hits”. Which is totally fine, I mean we are having this conversation on a DT forum, it’s not like popular equals good, but when we were told this project would be the “kings” of the genre it creates an expectation of a degree of popularity.

[Architeuthis]

The only potential radio friendly songs would either be Divine Addiction or Coming Home.  I'll be surprised if I ever hear either on the radio waves. Even mainstream hard rock radio is lame these days.

[bosk1]

The only potential radio friendly songs would either be Divine Addiction or Coming Home.  I'll be surprised if I ever hear either on the radio waves. Even mainstream hard rock radio is lame these days.

Lost in Oblivion and Alive could very well be considered "radio friendly" as well.  You just never know. 

[Architeuthis]

Oh yeah, Alive is a good call..

[rumborak]

Wow, so they only moved 5,200 copies in the first week? Maybe that marketing strategy didn’t go over so well.

I think people often underestimate the drop-off in album charts. #1 might sell 1 million copies, but #50 is orders of magnitude lower, around 5,000 maybe. In that range the difference between #50 and #51 is whether one radio station played you or not.

I think a much more telling statistic is staying power. A lot of niche bands score one massive blip in the charts because their dedicated base buys the album on day one. But right after they disappear again.

[Herrick]

Yea...I have to say, a bunch of 50-60 year old men looking super tough in a dark room is NOT a good idea.

I mean that picture basically says "Y'all gonna get raped"

 

IMHO, this is the only way 50-60 year old guys should do band pics.



 

Yeah that really is a great band picture 

Old Man Tough Guy Band photos are ok if they actually play heavy brutal music but DT was never that band so it's always a bit awkward when they take those "edgy" band pictures.

[Madman Shepherd]

All right...so I finally got to listen to the whole album on a decent system (no crappy laptop speakers) and it solidified my opinion that this is a very bipolar album.  That being sad, I moved my vote from a 5 to a 6 which almost pains me. 

God of the Sun, Labyrinth, and Divine Addiction are excellent songs.  They save the album.  Oddly enough, some of the keyboards fall into cheese territory.  I personally think they sound great because I love that traditional synth sound BUT when I brought this up to my buddy he said his wife just started laughing during the first keyboard break in God of the Sun.  He also says the album is 10/10. 

Coming Home and Sign of the Times are pretty bad.  I thought they were decent even though I didn't personally like them.  I changed my mind.  They are just bland, boring songs.  Lost in Oblivion has decent moments. 

Opus Maximus  is underwhelming. 

Figaro's Whore is dumb. 

I don't dig Alive but I have to admit it is a decent song. 

So there ya have it.  3 excellent songs.  1 decent, 1 with moments, 2 terrible, 1 irrelevant, and then Figaro's Whore is the Peter Criss solo album of the group.  In other words, "Oh yeah, he also released a solo album"..."Oh yeah, Derek has an intro song"

The whole roll out of this album was screwed up from the moment Bumblefoot was figured out to be the guitarist to Mike freaking out that people found out to two very subpar releases to hype the album.  Had they released God of the Sun or Labyrinth, it would have been the bold, progressive way to hype the album.  It would have got me excited.  Instead, two weeks later I'm trying to decide if I should buy it being the completist I am or just let it go. 

[Nick]

So, I'm going to update my thoughts a little bit. I still think that fans were mislead leading up to this release in what to expect, but with the more listens that I distance myself from that the more I like this album. I know the consensus seems to be that Bumblefoot surprised a lot of people, and while I really do like him on this I still give the MVP to Sherinian who, although like the album wasn't groundbreaking, did a fantastic job. It really could fall within my top 10 or even top 5 this year.

On a side note, the beginning of Alive, along with some other moments, is it just me or does JSS sound a bit like Ray Alder?

[erwinrafael]

Lost in Oblivion is a missed opportunity. The opening riff by Ron Thal is killer...then the song did not build on that riff and just came back to it in the instrumental.

[pcs90]

After a few weeks of this being out I still feel the same way I did when I first heard it. Bumblefoot is definitely the highlight, there are a few decent keyboard moments, but overall a boring album. The amount of material from this I would listen to over and over would easily total under 10 minutes, probably closer to 5. It just feels really uninspired. The instrumental sections are technical for the sake of being technical, most of Derek's solos are just runs with no emotion, Portnoy is bringing nothing new or interesting to the table...

[Cyclopssss]

My problem with hearing Portnoy's and Sherinian's playing is thinking: 'oh yeah, heard that before, oh, they're doing that again?' and more along those lines, which really isn't fair, but a natural reaction. I think it's a decent album, no more. A lot of the 'big' songs on the album detract my enjoyment because of those recognizable fills/riffs. But still I will give it a fair chance.

[bill1971]

I think Derek needs to tweet something again, talk of the album itself is slowing down. After a week or so the only song I would want to hear again is Labyrinth, possibly God of the Sun. For those that love or really like the album, I am happy that there is a new great album for you. For me it just fell flat. Has a very been there done that to me.

[shadystraz360]

For some reason i couldnt post it here so i could only post somewhere public and share the link. Has anyone else read this article?

https://www.facebook.com/groups/265473153813560/permalink/519593841734822/

[cramx3]

Yea now that some time has passed, I haven't come back to this at all.  Two other albums released the same day by debut bands (VUUR and Cyhra) have had me coming back, but this one, while I did enjoy it, just doesn't have the hooks to make me want to hear it again.  I'm sure I will listen again, just that I don't have the itching to do so.  It would be nice to see them announce some tour dates soon though.

[Sycsa]

So the cringe saga continues. Over the past few days, the official SoA FB page has been sharing pages of “unofficial fanclubs,” all of them having similar design, and a few dozen likes each (Indonesia has just 7 at this point.)

This all looks fishy, as if Derek himself set them up. He’s also probably commeting in the name of the official SoA page, saying stuff like “will it have breathy vocals?” when someone proposed to set up the UK branch. Sophisticated humor, what can I say. Another guy commented “Hmm, I think this is band is gonna cause an "astonishing " retirement,” which was liked by SoA. I unliked the page and I’m glad I didn’t buy the album.

https://www.facebook.com/SonsOfApollo1/posts/234152550451885

[The Walrus]

It's okay. Sons will be lucky to get through 2018. Quote me on this, Mike will be announcing another 'main band' or departure from Sons a year from now, or the band will split entirely, complete with a rant on nobody buying records anymore and the industry is shit etc.

[Adami]

It's okay. Sons will be lucky to get through 2018. Quote me on this, Mike will be announcing another 'main band' or departure from Sons a year from now, or the band will split entirely, complete with a rant on nobody buying records anymore and the industry is shit etc.

I don't really care for this band, but I feel confident they will have one more album in them. Possibly a slight lineup  change between now and then, but definitely a 2nd album and even a live DVD.