Author Topic: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread  (Read 539587 times)

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Offline darkshade

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #910 on: May 31, 2012, 06:31:14 PM »
Let me correct myself, and say, if the artist considers it one PIECE of music, then I do too; not necessarily one SONG.

I cannot listen to ?, or The Whirlwind, or GoD, or SDOIT without listening to the whole thing. Starting ? at the middle of the album would just not make sense to me.

Offline KevShmev

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #911 on: May 31, 2012, 06:37:59 PM »
Eh, I think certain artists like calling long suites like that single songs just they can say, "We have a song insert a big number long." :lol 

Besides, Mike Portnoy even said on the last TA DVD that The Whirlwind can be taken as one long song or as a bunch on shorter songs that all go together, and I suspect the same would apply to the other examples you just gave.  Calling ? one song would be like calling The Who's Tommy or Floyd's The Wall one song.  We all know that it is a bunch of songs that all together to form a concept or theme, so let's just leave it at that.  :biggrin:

Offline The Letter M

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #912 on: May 31, 2012, 06:38:49 PM »
Let me correct myself, and say, if the artist considers it one PIECE of music, then I do too; not necessarily one SONG.

I cannot listen to ?, or The Whirlwind, or GoD, or SDOIT without listening to the whole thing. Starting ? at the middle of the album would just not make sense to me.

Pretty much my view, as well. I prefer "Artists' Intent" when it comes to categorizing songs/pieces. And in many cases, like the above examples, the artist does indeed consider the whole work a single piece of music, sometimes even as a single song, just indexed into smaller sections.

Sometimes, larger works are indexed into sections for easier listening (like SDOIT and TW), while others aren't indexed at all, like classic examples of "Tarkus", "Close To The Edge", or "Supper's Ready". Sometimes those longer pieces with movements that aren't individually tracked sound like they should have been, and perhaps the only reason many consider them one song/piece is because they were indexed that way, and in fact they just sounds like suites, even with full-stops and dead-silence between movements, rather than segueing or cross-fading seamlessly between movements.

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Offline hefdaddy42

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #913 on: May 31, 2012, 06:52:52 PM »
? is not one song in any way, shape or form.
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Offline The Letter M

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #914 on: May 31, 2012, 07:10:00 PM »
? is not one song in any way, shape or form.

At least, no any more so than "The Whirlwind" or "Garden Of Dreams".

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Offline darkshade

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #915 on: May 31, 2012, 07:11:51 PM »
? is not one song in any way, shape or form.

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Offline Nick

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #916 on: May 31, 2012, 07:12:39 PM »
? is not one song in any way, shape or form.

What really is the difference between the The Whirlwind as a studio album and how it was presented live? Just that the studio version has arbitrary electronic cuts in it. Really at the end of the day, if tracked as one, all concept albums are just a really long cohesive song. So while it's technically not in the classic sense, I don't see any problem with somebody looking at ?, or any similar album as a song in some ways.

And also, Seeds of Gold is great, but So Many Roads is the best epic he's done solo.

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Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #917 on: June 01, 2012, 07:52:32 AM »
? is not one song in any way, shape or form.

What really is the difference between the The Whirlwind as a studio album and how it was presented live? Just that the studio version has arbitrary electronic cuts in it. Really at the end of the day, if tracked as one, all concept albums are just a really long cohesive song. So while it's technically not in the classic sense, I don't see any problem with somebody looking at ?, or any similar album as a song in some ways.

And also, Seeds of Gold is great, but So Many Roads is the best epic he's done solo.

I need more listens, but "So Many Roads" -at least initially- is more appealing to me than "Seeds of Gold" which, for some reason, I find a bit on the dull side.

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #918 on: June 01, 2012, 09:44:15 AM »
I love Seeds of Gold, but I assure you that it wouldn't get half the attention it gets now if Mike Portnoy would've never mentioned that Seeds of Gold was like his favorite Neal Morse epic ever.

People in his forum/twitter/facebook go all like OMG MP LIKES IT IT'S GOLD LOL.

I still take it over So Many Roads, which honestly bores me quite a bit.
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Offline KevShmev

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #919 on: June 01, 2012, 10:00:59 AM »
I don't think that's true, considering he pimps everything he does pretty hard.  I don't see people going nuts over Adrenaline Mob, and he talks them up non-stop. :lol

Seeds of Gold is just a great tune from start to finish.  :tup :tup

Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #920 on: June 01, 2012, 11:43:41 AM »
Eh, it's OK, but it gets a bit boring in that middle "Run baby run" section.



Offline darkshade

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #921 on: June 01, 2012, 11:54:02 AM »
Seeds of Gold is fantastic. It took a while to wrap my head around it as the main disc of T2 overshadowed the second disc, but once the excitement for disc 1 settled down, I realized Seeds is one of Neal's best epics. Not my favorite by a long shot, but still very good, and a lot better than So Many Roads from what I remember; but I will go back to Lifeline soon enough.

Offline bosk1

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #922 on: June 01, 2012, 11:57:37 AM »
I realized Seeds is one of Neal's best epics.

If by "best" you mean, "most recent," then I agree.  It is indeed one of Neal's "best" epics.
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Offline darkshade

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #923 on: June 01, 2012, 01:33:35 PM »
I realized Seeds is one of Neal's best epics.

If by "best" you mean, "most recent," then I agree.  It is indeed one of Neal's "best" epics.

I don't know, last I checked, "best" is not a synonym for "most recent", and I think I would have realized that SOG was his most recent epic, as I bought Testimony 2 on release day. DUH.

 :biggrin: :heart

I will say, that there's at least 5 or 6 epics that top SOG; from both TA, SB and Neal's solo albums.

Offline The Letter M

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #924 on: June 01, 2012, 01:40:04 PM »
I realized Seeds is one of Neal's best epics.

If by "best" you mean, "most recent," then I agree.  It is indeed one of Neal's "best" epics.

I don't know, last I checked, "best" is not a synonym for "most recent", and I think I would have realized that SOG was his most recent epic, as I bought Testimony 2 on release day. DUH.

 :biggrin: :heart

I will say, that there's at least 5 or 6 epics that top SOG; from both TA, SB and Neal's solo albums.

Quantify epic? In my eyes, a Neal Morse "epic" is at least 20 minutes long. In that case, we've got...
"The Water"
"The Healing Colors Of Sound"
"The Great Nothing"
"All Of The Above"
"Duel With The Devil"
"Stranger In Your Soul"
"A Whole 'Nother Trip"
"The Door"
"The Conflict"
"So Many Roads"
"Seeds Of Gold"

And the upcoming "World Without End" (a 6-part epic on his new album Momentum), which tops out at nearly 34 minutes, his longest single piece of music yet!

What a list up there, and you're right, I'd pick 4 or 5 of those over "Seeds Of Gold"! Probably the 3 TA epics and "The Great Nothing" in the Top 4, then "So Many Roads" and "Seeds Of Gold" contend for 5th.

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Offline BlackInk

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #925 on: June 01, 2012, 01:44:36 PM »
At first I really enjoyed Neal's music but now after some time I can't stand listening to his voice, it just sounds so boring and dull I get physically tired hearing it. Which is a bit sad since he makes okay music.

Offline KevShmev

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #926 on: June 01, 2012, 01:47:28 PM »
Should the TA epics really count as Neal Morse epics? While he obviously had a heavy hand in writing those, he didn't write them by himself, unlike the SB and solo epics.

Offline bosk1

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #927 on: June 01, 2012, 01:49:12 PM »
Aside from a 20 minute cutoff being completely arbitrary, it is also wrong and leaves off some good epcis he was heavily involved in creating.
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Offline KevShmev

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #928 on: June 01, 2012, 01:53:13 PM »
True. You can't tell me that The Light, The Creation, The Separated Man, At the End of the Day, The Doorway, Flow, etc. aren't all epic. 

Offline bosk1

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #929 on: June 01, 2012, 02:25:10 PM »
True. You can't tell me that The Light, The Creation, The Separated Man, At the End of the Day, The Doorway, Flow, etc. aren't all epic. 

Exactly.  Marc is a good lad, so I hate to bust him like that.  But you can't look at that list and tell me those aren't some classic NM epics.
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Offline The Letter M

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #930 on: June 01, 2012, 02:28:05 PM »
True. You can't tell me that The Light, The Creation, The Separated Man, At the End of the Day, The Doorway, Flow, etc. aren't all epic.

Fair enough, but I think Neal himself might consider his lengthier pieces to be his "more epic" epics.

If I included anything that was over 10 minutes long, the list would be incredible! Then, of course, there'd be the obligatory "Let's rank them"...

Either way, here's what I would consider in Neal's Epics list:
"The Light"
"Go The Way You Go"
"The Water"
"The Doorway"
"Time Has Come"
"The Good Don't Last"
"Harm's Way"
"Flow"
"Crack The Big Sky" (by 1 second, it's 9:59 long, but I think it's a bit epic)
"The Healing Colors Of Sound"
"At The End Of The Day"
"The Great Nothing"
"A Whole 'Nother Trip"
"The Creation"
"The Separated Man"
"The Door"
"The Conflict"
"The Conclusion"
"Lifeline"
"So Many Roads"
"Set The Kingdom" (pretty epic riffing!)
"Seeds Of Gold"
"All Of The Above"

I included AOTA mostly because his demo made up a large majority of the final song, where as DWTD and SIYS did include sizable contributions from the rest of Transatlantic. I also did not include Flying Colors' "Infinite Fire", despite it sounding a LOT like it was a Neal Morse demo to begin with.

I also didn't include pieces like "Help Me/The Spirit And The Flesh", or even "Author Of Confusion" and "Reunion", although the latter is pretty epic to me. I suppose, if you wanted, you could include ALL three of those. Then one might also consider if the 8 "Parts" of Testimony/Testimony 2 could be considered epics as they are all viewed as songs in a single piece of music (segued together), and many times, they do sound like they SHOULD be one piece. In that case, you have 8 more epics that you could consider adding to this list, ranging from 10:33 to 41:08.

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Offline bosk1

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #931 on: June 01, 2012, 02:33:23 PM »
I don't even know if I could rank them.  :lol
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Offline The Letter M

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #932 on: June 01, 2012, 03:40:27 PM »
I don't even know if I could rank them.  :lol

Go by tiers, I suppose, and then within each of those tiers, rank those songs. It'd be quite the undertaking, but I might take a stab at it by the end of the night...or weekend.

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Offline darkshade

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #933 on: June 01, 2012, 04:00:59 PM »
Man, so many good songs listed. His epics really are the best songs from him. Don't get me wrong I love most of Neal's work, but it seems that 85% of his output are epics, if you include the Testimony 1 and 2 suites as single pieces.

Offline bosk1

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #934 on: June 01, 2012, 04:03:39 PM »
Just...listened to...the solo in...Upon The Door...all out of breath...  I'm just going to sit here and hug myself for a few minutes.
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Offline hefdaddy42

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #935 on: June 01, 2012, 04:05:01 PM »
Yeah, good solo.

BTW, I can't rank all of those WTF
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Offline Ħ

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #936 on: June 01, 2012, 04:42:44 PM »
"The Light", "All of the Above", "Stranger in your Soul" are my favorite NM epics. I much prefer the shorter songs from his solo stuff.
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Offline DarkLord_Lalinc

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #937 on: June 04, 2012, 08:42:28 AM »
I do think Transatlantic epics are a bit better than Neal Morse solo epics.

Duel with the Devil, Stranger in your Soul and All of the Above are all 10/10 for me. I know The Whirlwind is a song by itself, but I like treating it like an album (it's easier to digest that way), so I'm not including it in this.

I don't think that's true, considering he pimps everything he does pretty hard.  I don't see people going nuts over Adrenaline Mob, and he talks them up non-stop. :lol

Seeds of Gold is just a great tune from start to finish.  :tup :tup

And yes Kev, you're probably right. Seeds of Gold is indeed great, it's just that I can help to think of MP saying that and people on his forum going all over "It's probably gonna be a blast MP...Carpe Diem!...It's probably the best thing you've done since *insert last side-project here*

And just to stray a little bit from the epic thing, I'm deeply in love with Chance of a Lifetime. It's such an incredible tune, and very catchy too.
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Offline KevShmev

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #938 on: June 04, 2012, 09:15:09 AM »
Chance of a Lifetime is really good, but I have to admit that it is the song I listen to the least from Disc 1 of T2.  I almost never have time to listen to the whole album, or even all of Disc 1, from start to finish, so I am usually picking out songs here and there to listen to, and that is one I almost always skip past.  On another album, it might be one I listen to a lot, but on an album this good, one with so many great songs, it sort of gets lost in the shuffle.  But you know what...I think I'll throw it on my iPod now for my workout here in a bit. :)

Offline darkshade

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #939 on: June 04, 2012, 10:58:11 AM »
Listening to Testimony 2 right now. I forgot how good Nighttime Collectors and Time Has Come Today is. One of the most rockin songs Neal has put out.

Chance Of A Lifetime was, along with Crossing Over/Mercy Street Reprise, my favorite song when T2 first came out. But every song on the album is outstanding, and one of his strongest albums.

Offline ronnibran

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #940 on: June 13, 2012, 05:14:54 PM »
As far as Neal epics go (including Transatlantic), I think Seeds of Gold is probably my least favorite.  To me, it sounds the most generic and uninspired (disc 1 of T2 is amongst my favorite Neal stuff, though, I just never listen to disc 2).  So Many Roads, on the other hand, is probably my favorite song ever.  So I don't get the general "meh" reaction to it, but hey, my opinion is usually not a popular one.

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #941 on: June 13, 2012, 06:11:09 PM »
Chance of a Lifetime is really good, but I have to admit that it is the song I listen to the least from Disc 1 of T2.  I almost never have time to listen to the whole album, or even all of Disc 1, from start to finish, so I am usually picking out songs here and there to listen to, and that is one I almost always skip past.  On another album, it might be one I listen to a lot, but on an album this good, one with so many great songs, it sort of gets lost in the shuffle.  But you know what...I think I'll throw it on my iPod now for my workout here in a bit. :)
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Offline Scrub206

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #942 on: July 15, 2012, 08:12:06 PM »
Im pretty pumped for new Neal Morse album!  :metal  a 33 minute long epic sounds about right  :biggrin:

(i didnt see it anywhere here so : https://www.radiantrecords.com/products/396-momentum-special-edition.aspx )


Offline darkshade

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #943 on: July 15, 2012, 08:26:24 PM »
YES. I love the behind the scenes with these guys, and Transatlantic. The Flower Kings' new album had some in-studio footage too.

Neal did it for Testimony 2, which was great, though you could tell Portnoy was still in the dumps from his recent departure from DT during a couple interview moments.

Offline Nihil-Morari

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Re: Official Neal Morse Appreciation Thread
« Reply #944 on: July 16, 2012, 03:03:09 AM »
BTW: Thoughts part 5?


I know of part one and two.
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