Author Topic: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album  (Read 17793 times)

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Offline vazquez

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #35 on: February 12, 2018, 06:16:25 PM »
This is the least accurate thread subject I have seen in my ~10 years here.

Your criteria is very questionable and limited.

1) One instrument used on one song.
2) One great instrumental, which, even if great, is one song out of a total of 11 total.
3) Great hooks - largely subjective.
4) Soul - again subjective. Having "soul" doesn't make a song any better or more enjoyable. 
5) The least talented musician they've had in their line-up, and one they didn't even want for another album.

I agree.
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Offline goo-goo

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #36 on: February 12, 2018, 06:59:37 PM »
To me, FII has stood against the test of time. It's aged pretty well and it's the DT that I keep coming back the most.

Offline geeeemo

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #37 on: February 12, 2018, 10:35:36 PM »
You say the Last truly great album. Well, I think all the albums are Great! (I don't include WDADU -no JLB) Each is different and obviously I have favorites as anyone would, but that is fluid. The complaint of wankery and whatever else starting with SFOM, makes me think you really were never into DT that much anyway. So back to the comtment to Last Great Album. It is The Astonishing, because it is their last album and they are all Great.  And lest a huge flop (highly unlikely), the next album will be the Last truly great album.

Offline IDontNotDoThings

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #38 on: February 13, 2018, 01:05:55 AM »
FFI is a pretty awesome album. Trial of Tears, Peruvian skies and Lines in the Sand are some pretty solid songs. With that said, FFI is not even in the top 5 for DT in albums that were released after 1999. There could be an argument that their last great album was Six degrees or Octavarium. But I feel that people under appreciate Dramatic turn of Evebts and self titled album. The melodic lines in Surrender to Reason, Bigger Picture and This is the Life are some of DTs best. Here is my top list for Albums released after FFI:

Six Degrees
Metropolis pt 2
Octavarium
DT12
Systematic Chaos
Train of Thoughts
FFI

Falling Finfo Infinity?


Also, I think everyone's forgetting SFAM exists
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Offline pg1067

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #39 on: February 13, 2018, 10:54:07 AM »
Also, I think everyone's forgetting SFAM exists

By "everyone," you mean almost no one who's posted in this thread.  Right?
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Offline Super Dude

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #40 on: February 13, 2018, 11:16:18 AM »
To me, FII has stood against the test of time. It's aged pretty well and it's the DT that I keep coming back the most.

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Offline don_waka

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #41 on: February 13, 2018, 12:26:53 PM »
Musically I'd go for Six Degrees and then Falling into Infinity (the non-official version, though).

Offline bill1971

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #42 on: February 13, 2018, 12:56:33 PM »
I disagree, I think it is The Astonishing.

Offline Architeuthis

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #43 on: February 13, 2018, 01:03:52 PM »
The Astonishing is tied for 1st place for me with Octavarium and DT12.
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Offline TheOutlawXanadu

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #44 on: February 13, 2018, 01:40:24 PM »
In my opinion:

Scenes: Great
Six Degrees: Great
Train: Has great moments; don't usually listen to in full
Octavarium: Very good
Chaos: Has great moments; don't usually listen to in full
Clouds: Has great moments; don't usually listen to in full
Dramatic Turn: Very good
DT12: Very good
Astonishing: Very good when I'm in the mood

Clearly, I disagree with the OP! :biggrin:
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Offline Evai

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #45 on: February 13, 2018, 02:54:03 PM »
Yay more album rating!  :laugh:

Scenes: Great!!!!
Six Degrees: Great!!!!
Train: Ehhhh
Octavarium: Great!!!!!
Chaos: Great!!!!
Clouds: Great!!!!!
Dramatic Turn: Ehhhhh
DT12: Ehhhhhh
Astonishing: GREAT!!!!!!!
Jordan took Moore's boring, pedestrian parts and elevated them considerably to take them from barely palatable to stellar.

Offline Super Dude

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #46 on: February 13, 2018, 03:22:37 PM »
Very well.

SFAM: Okay
SDOIT: Good
ToT: Yuck
8VM: Gooder but not great
SC: Meh
BCSL: Meh
ADToE: Good
DT12: Yuck
TA: It’s...astonishing this saw the light of day! (Laugh track)
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Offline bosk1

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #47 on: February 13, 2018, 04:14:21 PM »
SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps.  But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments.  But probably not a "great album" on balance.  One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.

The defense rests.  :biggrin:
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Offline IDontNotDoThings

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #48 on: February 13, 2018, 04:26:35 PM »
Also, I think everyone's forgetting SFAM exists

By "everyone," you mean almost no one who's posted in this thread.  Right?

I Ctrl-F'd "SFAM" & "Scenes" when I posted that (on the actual posting page) & it yielded no results for some reason. Idk why but it's working now.  :\
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Offline Super Dude

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #49 on: February 13, 2018, 05:52:11 PM »
SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps.  But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments.  But probably not a "great album" on balance.  One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.

The defense rests.  :biggrin:

Joke's on you, we're arguing in equity!
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Offline pg1067

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #50 on: February 13, 2018, 06:14:56 PM »
Joke's on you, we're arguing in equity!

Coincidentally, "Arguing in Equity" will be the title of DT14.  You heard it here first!   :eek
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Offline IDontNotDoThings

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #51 on: February 13, 2018, 06:40:22 PM »
SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps.  But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments.  But probably not a "great album" on balance.  One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.

The defense rests.  :biggrin:

Joke's on you, we're arguing in equity!

 ???
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Offline Lethean

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #52 on: February 13, 2018, 07:28:00 PM »
SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps.  But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments.  But probably not a "great album" on balance.  One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.

The defense rests.  :biggrin:
I pretty much agree with this to a T.  Except I like Black Clouds more than SC and would actually put BC in the great category, with SC getting almost great. :)  Everything else is pretty much dead on. :)

Offline Super Dude

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #53 on: February 14, 2018, 05:44:06 AM »
SFAM: Truly great
SDOIT: Truly great
ToT: Great
8VM: Great
SC: Mostly great, but a few missteps.  But as a whole, I would give it a "great."
BCSL: Great moments.  But probably not a "great album" on balance.  One of only two that I rank lower than FII.
ADToE: Truly great.
DT12: Truly great.
TA: Truly great.

The defense rests.  :biggrin:

Joke's on you, we're arguing in equity!

 ???

It’s a law joke (bosk and one other person who I don’t think is active here anymore were a mentor to me while I was in law school). Sorry.
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Offline bosk1

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #54 on: February 14, 2018, 07:26:08 AM »
And a mighty fine law joke, I might add.  :clap:

And I'm flattered that you would consider me having been a "mentor" of sorts.  I felt like my bad side, which came out too often for me to be happy with in retrospect, might have been more offputting than mentorish.  Not sure whether the good outweighed the bad for you, or whether just the passage of time has blunted your memory of the bad.  But either way, it's nice to know that you choose to focus on the positive.
« Last Edit: February 14, 2018, 10:57:40 AM by bosk1 »
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Online SchecterShredder

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #55 on: February 14, 2018, 10:38:56 AM »
FII is my least favorite DT album so I have to disagree.

Nail on the head.

Offline 7enderbender

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #56 on: February 14, 2018, 10:50:38 AM »
Unfortunately, that is spot on. There were a few after that that I really liked, namely Octavarium, Systematic Chaos and Dramatic Turn, but the change in keyboard sounds and approach (as incredibly talented as Jordan Rudass is) never fully jived with me. And now with Petrucci being 100% in charge of songwrting and production I'm not sure there will be much again that'll work for me.
A lot of it was pretty decent still, but the last two albums, Scenes from a Memory and Six Degrees I find for the most part unlistenable and cringeworthy.

Offline The Walrus

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #57 on: February 14, 2018, 11:54:02 AM »
Quote from: 7enderbender
And now with Petrucci being 100% in charge of songwrting and production

That's not true. I need to check the booklets to be certain but James wrote a couple songs on ADTOE, Myung wrote lyrics to at least one song that I can think of since MP's departure, and JR shared songwriting duties with John for The Astonishing. He might be in charge of the bulk but he's not the sole composer or lyricist.
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Offline Super Dude

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #58 on: February 14, 2018, 01:00:38 PM »
And a mighty fine law joke, I might add.  :clap:

And I'm flattered that you would consider me having been a "mentor" of sorts.  I felt like my bad side, which came out too often for me to be happy with in retrospect, might have been more offputting than mentorish.  Not sure whether the good outweighed the bad for you, or whether just the passage of time has blunted your memory of the bad.  But either way, it's nice to know that you choose to focus on the positive.

Thanks bosk. I’m definitely one to focus on the positives, which is why I pretend albums after FII don’t exist. :biggrin:
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Offline LCArenas

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #59 on: February 15, 2018, 01:14:24 PM »
Nah mate

Nah mate

Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence mate

Offline SleeperAwake

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #60 on: February 21, 2018, 03:04:12 PM »
I'd say Six Degrees was the last great DT album.

But Falling into Infinity is also great. Listening to it now.

Offline Samsara

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #61 on: February 21, 2018, 03:52:59 PM »
It had Chapman stick, it had the incredible instrumental Hell’s Kitchen, greats hooks, soul (see Anna Lee), and it had Derek mf’ing Sherinian. Discuss.

Agree. I have not liked Dream Theater nearly as much once DS was canned, and JR was hired. DT became LTE with vocals to my ear. I still like them, but nowhere near as much. They lost a lot lyrically and sonically when Kevin left. DS helped infuse a little Jon Lord inspired keys and that was cool, even if lyrically something was off a bit. But it was still cool. Would have loved to have seen where DT would have went with DS still in the band for another album.

But as time has shown, the keyboardist in Dream Theater is integral to their songwriting and sound, and unfortunately, I just don't connect as much with Jordan (even though I respect him a great deal).
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Offline Super Dude

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #62 on: February 23, 2018, 01:14:30 PM »
It had Chapman stick, it had the incredible instrumental Hell’s Kitchen, greats hooks, soul (see Anna Lee), and it had Derek mf’ing Sherinian. Discuss.

Agree. I have not liked Dream Theater nearly as much once DS was canned, and JR was hired. DT became LTE with vocals to my ear. I still like them, but nowhere near as much. They lost a lot lyrically and sonically when Kevin left. DS helped infuse a little Jon Lord inspired keys and that was cool, even if lyrically something was off a bit. But it was still cool. Would have loved to have seen where DT would have went with DS still in the band for another album.

But as time has shown, the keyboardist in Dream Theater is integral to their songwriting and sound, and unfortunately, I just don't connect as much with Jordan (even though I respect him a great deal).

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Offline Lethean

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #63 on: February 23, 2018, 01:55:12 PM »
I suppose I should consider myself lucky.  I love Jordan. :) 

Offline Cool Chris

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #64 on: February 23, 2018, 06:00:41 PM »
DT sounds nothing like LTE to me. I can't listen to more than 3 minutes of LTE but I am generally not interested in instrumental acts, so that is my personal preference. I don't think DS added anything noteworthy to FII, and I doubt he would have if he stayed with them.
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Offline gzarruk

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #65 on: February 23, 2018, 07:18:12 PM »
I don't think DS added anything noteworthy to FII, and I doubt he would have if he stayed with them.

I think the same way. The only keyboard highlight to me on FII is THAT solo on Trial of Tears, but the rest is pretty meh.
It sounds like, "ruk, ruk, ruk, ruk, ruk." Instead of the more pleasing kick drum sound of, "gzarruk, gzarruk, gzarruk, gzarruk."

Offline PetFish

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #66 on: February 23, 2018, 08:59:10 PM »
Agree. I have not liked Dream Theater nearly as much once DS was canned, and JR was hired.

Try not to think of it like this.  Rudess was who they wanted from the get-go but wasn't available so they went with Sherinian.  So when Rudess then became available Sherinian was bumped.  I do remember hearing LTE and also the one-time live show they did with Rudess thinking how awesome it would be to have Rudess in the band and then like a month later it happened... and this was before I knew too much of the post-Moore keyboard adventures.


As for rankings, I really don't participate in them, I find it shallow to rank art vs art, particularly within the same artist, I have no problem saying what I personally prefer, but that can also change depending on where my head is at, but I mostly "rank" them all equal cuz they represent a time in my life and theirs that means something for that period.

I also think this conversation would be different had FII been the double album w/ACoS (and/or demo versions) they wanted initially.

My only gripe with FII is the Chapman stick.  Unless it's your main thing (Tony Levin), it's just stupid.  It was a gimmick they tried when they were trying absolutely everything (which I mostly enjoyed this diversity and experimentation) to please the suits and Myung plays it like a regular bass for most of the song anyway.

Offline pcs90

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #67 on: February 24, 2018, 12:53:06 AM »
The last 3 albums as well as SDOIT have all been amazing IMO.
I do enjoy several tracks from FII, and the mix is clearer than some others so that's a plus! Derek's most noteworthy contributions for me are on LITS and Trial of Tears. I am actually glad he left because he's released a lot of other albums which are more interesting than what he did in DT. Could he have done that anyway? Sure, but it may have been less likely and taken longer.
FII isn't my least favorite album...I'd probably put it somewhere in the middle.

Offline Super Dude

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #68 on: February 24, 2018, 11:06:40 AM »
Agree. I have not liked Dream Theater nearly as much once DS was canned, and JR was hired.

I also think this conversation would be different had FII been the double album w/ACoS (and/or demo versions) they wanted initially.

Good point. If it had been released sounding like the demo versions, I would have discarded it as inane, over-bloated garbage. :biggrin:
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Offline Cool Chris

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Re: Falling Into Infinity was actually the last truly great DT album
« Reply #69 on: February 24, 2018, 11:43:47 AM »
had FII been the double album w/ACoS (and/or demo versions) they wanted initially.

I would have discarded it as inane, over-bloated garbage. :biggrin:

I hate to think of anything with ACoS on it as garbage (though I have a low opinion of the EP), but I can't disagree with this. 
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