To me, "old DT" is pre-SC, so 8vm is musically closer to Six Degrees than anything that came after it, despite the 'influences on their sleeve' becoming more noticeable here.
Okay I
really don't see this. If anything, with the more streamlined song structures and emphasis on lighter textures, it's probably as close to The Astonishing as it is to Six Degrees. The idea that all the pre-SC albums can be grouped together as a unit of "old DT" just feels really bizarre. Images and Words sounds hardly like Falling Into Infinity, Which sounds hardly like Train of Thought, which sounds hardly like When Dream and Day Unite. I don't think Distance Over Time is that much like A Dramatic Turn of Events either, so I think it's fair to say that the trend has continued.
The big difference with post-8vm DT is the reliance to fall back on their metal leanings, which did NOT go away when MP left. It's all over the Mangini albums. They used to have a better balance between the different styles they bring to the table. I thought Black Clouds was moving in the right direction and that was the closest to the old style over the last 6 albums, especially the last 2 songs. Now, their sound is overly metal with 'arena rock' choruses (for lack of a better term) + a host of other things thrown into the mix, minus a few lighter tunes they've made since.
For one, I honestly feel like it's overstated how much emphasis Roadrunner DT puts on metal. Systematic Chaos and Black Clouds and Silver Linings are both very dynamic albums that, sure, have a lot of metal, but they also have The Best of Times, Repentence, the intro and second half of The Count of Tuscany, the mid-section of A Nightmare to Remember, most of The Ministry of Lost Souls and so on. They might be heavier than your average Dream Theater album, but honestly that's just down to the extremes being more intense. The reason for which is probably just because more extreme metal was beginning to take hold in the mainstream a bit more. They
fall back on their metal leanings (which I think is a bit of a strange thing to say, given that Dream Theater have always defined themselves as a progressive metal band, it's been the core of their sound since day one) about as much as Awake and WDaDU and much less so than Train of Thought.
With post-MP DT, it's mostly the same story, except all but D/T are arguably less heavy than Six Degrees too. The main difference I noticed from MP to MM era is that, while there aren't necessarily way more softer songs, they have more sonically louder yet dynamic tracks where they still aren't in-your-face heavy (think Breaking All Illusions, Surrender to Reason, The Gift of Music or Barstool Warrior). Even when they do go heavier too, it's generally tempered with keyboard textures or melodic vocals that add a different dimension to the music rather than pure aggression. There's not much like A Rite of Passage, Constant Motion or The Dark Eternal Night on the 4 MM era albums. There are exceptions (like the 2nd verse of AWE or first verse of IT), but... well, they're exceptions and at that point they provide a welcome burst of energy.
Also, if you take issue with arena rock choruses... Octavarium might have quite a few of those, depending on how you'd define them.
The structure of their songs is also generally samey as well which is unfortunate but predictable with a band as old as they are who haven't tried to shake things up in that department in over 15 years. Most songs have the same general pop format of intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, solo section, chorus, outro, but with Dream Theater acrobatics of course;
They've... always had this formula though, at least to some degree. "intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, solo section, chorus, outro" is Pull Me Under, Misunderstood, Under a Glass Moon, Caught in a Web, Afterlife, Voices, Beyond This Life and so on. That's just common structure and it's
always been the structure of the majority of DT songs, doesn't mean you can't do a lot with it, as the variety in those tracks shows. Ironically the majority of The Astonishing probably deviates from that and yet you don't seem to like it, while Octavarium is practically fully immersed in that formula other than maybe the last two.
JP overpowering Myung Man with one note riffs on top of Mangini's computer drumming and JR playing dark epic chords in choir setting when he's not playing sad piano or Continuum wackanoodles, all while JLB, drenched in effects now, hits notes he can't reproduce regularly in single takes, nor is singing any melody that is memorable with any regularity.
Well the memorability thing is rather subjective, given that when I listen to any DT album other than maybe the debut, I tend to get like half of it stuck in my head, the newer material is very much included. "Computer drumming" is more down to a jab at the production than the player, which, fair enough I guess, even though it doesn't pertain directly to the music. The point about James hitting notes he can't reproduce regularly in single takes... is just incorrect, given the live albums that have been released in the last decade or so. Possible fixing here and there aside, he's doing pretty good for his age. The keyboard point could honestly be applied to any of their keyboardists, it's not like Kevin Moore had immense sonic range and Derek sure didn't, they just drew from a different (and usually smaller than JR) set of sounds. It also, again, wasn't any less the case on an album like Octavarium or even Scenes from a Memory. The funny thing about Myung too is that he was arguably more present on ADToE, DT12 and D/T than anything else since Six Degrees. I'm not even sure what you're referring to when you say one note riffs (A Fortune in Lies, Metropolis, The Mirror, Fatal Tragedy, The Glass Prison having actual one note riffs once again showing this is nothing new) because if there's anything to knock about modern DT, it probably isn't the guitar riffs.
JR's solo albums and JP's solo album + their LTE3 performances show me they still have the capabilities to make more original music, but for some reason I feel like they've put on these self-imposed rules of what sounds like DT and what doesn't, even if they're doing a 2 and a half hour Disney spin off to claim that they're "mixing things up". I think they need a producer or something. This is why I said Octavarium was the last gasp of old DT. The album had some of these structure problems I mentioned, but the songs themselves were diverse in sound, and the title track has a vast structure, even if it's one big crescendo with a climax.
This feels like cognitive dissonance. How exactly is TA
not mixing things up? It's not just a new kind of album for DT, but many songs do indeed have styles not seen before or since by them. Not to mention, most instances of them having external producers has been met with negative attention from both the band and the fans, so I highly doubt that's an avenue they want to be heading any time soon. I'm also curious how LTE3 shows their capacity for original music, given that much of it is pretty much in the spirit of late Portnoy era DT to the point of almost direct quotation. I like the album, but I really don't think it breaks any new ground. As for Octavarium, it may be varied but again, so is TA, probably moreso. I also struggle to think of two songs within the recent albums that are closely alike (well, maybe other than TA by virtue of it having so many songs), so it's not like they've gone musically monochrome. The point about the title track's vast structure could also be extended to Illumination Theory, Breaking All Illusions or even something like Outcry too.
I always thought DT would never fall into mediocrity in their later years, like so many bands of the past (all of them?) have, and thought they'd either know when to quit or keep new releases more spaced out. That was years before MP left. Like with Phish, while not into the new material much, I still like em and still keep up with what they're doing. Doesn't mean I can't criticize.
It's not that I think you can't criticise and you're perfectly welcome to not like new DT, it's just that a lot of the criticisms leave me a bit confused due to what I see as inconsistencies.