Regarding how fast Neal works on his albums, let us not forget that The Great Adventure went through a couple of iterations before it was released, including a whole new draft by Neal as it transformed into a sequel to TSOAD. They spent quite a bit of time on that one I believe.
With Transatlantic's The Absolute Universe, they spent over a year getting it finished and worked on it through 2020 to give us TWO (well, three) versions of the album, and with Neal having worked on the Abridged version, I think we can expect that one to sound really fresh as well.
And from what I can recall, didn't Flying Colors spend quite a few writing sessions on Third Degree before even getting together to record anything? I think I remember Neal or Mike talking about a few Skype calls the band had in the year or two leading up to Third Degree's release.
Then again, Neal did pump out Sola Gratia fairly quickly, but being a strictly solo album (with little input from anyone else, at least), I don't mind him not taking much longer to work on that one. As for the new NMB album, even though the writing was done in about 7-9 days, I trust them to put out a good album given how talented they all are.
I just don't understand the need some of these guys have, specially Mike, to pour out as much music as they can, as fast as they can, unless it's about financial struggles. Neal, however, has a great track record, so if he's confident enough to release this with his name on it, I'm in 
To isolate it on just Neal for a minute, since this is the Neal Morse thread after all 
, I think spacing things out a bit more at times would help, in regards to release dates and hype. A good example is late 2019. The Flying Colors new album had barely been released and all of a sudden the release a few months later of The Exorcist studio album was being hyped. Not saying fans cannot enjoy two albums released super close to each other, but spacing them out a bit couldn't hurt either. And it also felt like the Flying Colors album was released in a way and at a time where the band had almost no time to tour on it due to everything else the members had going on at the time. I mean, they did, what, 9-10 shows for that entire album cycle? It felt like the album kind of just came and went.
And I say that as someone who totally acknowledges how lucky I am to have one of my favorite musicians be so prolific; it's an embarrassment of riches, to be honest. Contrast to another favorite of mine in Radiohead, who releases a new album every other leap year nowadays. 
It just feels like at times that some of Neal's (or Neal-related) albums fall by the wayside more quickly than they should because it is always "on to the next!"
I do kind of agree with this to a certain extent. Flying Colors really did fly by in late 2019, and it's a prime example of how fast Neal's works just sort of come and go. Heck, look at 2020 alone - Neal was a part of 5 releases!!! You had the Great AdvenTour show, the new Morse Portnoy George Cover album, Sola Gratia, the Flying Colors Third Degree tour set, and the JCTE live show from Morsefest 2019.
If anyone recalls my thread that compared the discographies of Steven Wilson, Roine Stolt, and Neal Morse (three of the most prolific writers and performers in prog music over the last 25+ years), even though all three have had pretty stuffed careers, it seems that Neal is the only one who has kept up their pace steadily, and at his current rate, he doesn't show signs of slowing down. For 2021 so far, we've got new Transatlantic and, sometime this year, a new NMB album. If it wasn't for COVID and the inability to tour, I'm sure we would've gotten a live album from Neal this year, too! Maybe if he wants to make the money from it, he could release Morsefest 2020 for some sort of live release this year. Or maybe he'll release another singer-songwriter album as well.
After last year, it'll seem weird to only get two albums with Neal on them this year.
-Marc.
Topic: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread (Read 549113 times)
