Dream Theater Album: “Train of Thought”

My bemused friends. This is the 516th review of this album and of the previous 515 reviews none are truly helpful. Therfore, after reading numerous of these reviews, I am going to analyze their findings and make recommendations accordingly.

The reason for the wildly varying opinions of Train of Thought, is because with this CD, Dream Theater is entering a new phase on their musical evolution. They have prudently and rightly ascertained that to keep recording, what is basically the same material, is effectively a death sentence.

So, What do we have here? Well it looks like about 20 % of the reviewers (one and two stars) who professed to be die hard fans were shocked by the new Dream Theater and subsequently hated TOT. Obviously if you as a potential buyer are dogmatic and are looking for the same old (but still very good) sound, you shouldn't buy TOT.

The next group we have (Three stars) is the ones who don't know what to make of TOT. They don't seem to rushing to judgement (though they've written reviews) and are somewhat ambivalent. About 15% of our reviewers felt this way and I was one of these people at first but after multiple listens became a fan. That's right, I think TOT takes multiple listens to appreciate but let's face it isn't DT worth multiple listens. What else are we going to listen to, Beyonce? So if you are this kind of person, you should go ahead and buy TOT. Worse case, it won't grow on you and you end up with a mediocre album but the upside is worth it.

Next (four stars) at about 25% is the group that appreciates TOT and DT's latest endeavor and their need to experiment and grow and voice opinions that although TOT is not DT's best or second best or even third best album it is a very good album in it's own right. Again if I may be redundant, what are your options, Janet Jackson? OOPS!

Lastly of course we have the true die hard DT fans (five stars), about 40%, who think TOT is great, one of their best and can't for the life of them, understand how anyone could not love this album and say so in their reviews. I kinda side with them but I can understand where the other groups are coming from. I guess I'm in between groups three and four at about 4 1/2 stars.

SUMMARY:

If you like the old Dream Theater just fine, thank you, and do not wish to experiment on a newer and slightly heavier DT - PASS

If you are not as rigid but think you may like the old DT better - IT'S YOR CALL, it's still Dream Theater!

If you are flexible and open to new stuff, especially from DT - ABSOLUTELY!

If you are an extreme, die hard Dream Theater fan. You probably have it already.

MY BOTTOM LINE:

Dream Theater is the most visable, most revered and best known of all PROG ROCK/METAL bands. By being the number one progressive band in the world they have been anointed to carry the torch through the dark passages of mundane popular music. Though they are not my personal favorite Progressive band, I do love them and feel for them as they carry a heavy burden. Long Live Dream Theater. You may not like the alternative.

Dream Theater's new album is definitely their heaviest since "Awake", if not ever. It's mostly good, and I like it better than their last album, "Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence". It's less experimental, and a more straight-forward sounding metal album. Though this does have the odd time signatures and crazy instrumental sections we've come to expect from Dream Theater.

"As I Am" is a catchy, fairly simple metal song, with a main riff that sounds a bit like Metallica's "Enter Sandman". It grew on me, but it's probably the weakest song on the album, and the solo adds nothing to it really, in my opinion. "This Dying Soul" is much better. Heavy, 7 String guitar riffs drive it, much like it's predecessor, "The Glass Prison". "Endless Sacrifice" has some beautiful melodies in the verse, and a loud, Pantera-esque chorus. The instrumental section is also the best on the album, reminding me of "Awake" and "Change of Seasons" (That's a good thing, as I prefer the older albums by far to the newer ones.) "Honor Thy Father" isn't bad, the chorus has a badass, Black Label Society-ish metal riff that I like. "Vacant" is beautiful, and it leads into the instrumental "Stream of Conciousness", which is pretty awesome as well. The main riff somewhat brings to mind "Orion" by Metallica. This is the longest and one of the more complex DT instrumentals, featuring loads of time changes and key changes, and lots of soloing. "In The Name of God" is the 14 minute epic that closes the album, and it's a great song. There's a good mix of good melodies and heavy riffs, and the instrumental section has some pretty sick playing by everyone. The piano outro is pretty nice too.

There's pros and cons to the heavier, more aggressive sound on this album. There's definitely a lack of great melodies, especially during the instrumental sections, which instead of interesting melodic lines, they are pretty much just going up and down scales. At ridiculous speeds, no doubt, but it's just not as interesting, at least not to me. Also, John Petrucci used to be able to balance shredding with great melodies and compose some amazing solos ("Under a Glass Moon" for example, or "Scarred".) Here, he mainly just shreds, which is cool, but limiting.

On the other hand, the aggressive sound is pretty cool. A lot of the riffs are quite awesome. "This Dying Soul", "Honor Thy Father" and "In The Name of God" all have some ass-kicking heavy riffs, reminiscent of Pantera or early Metallica...A cool thing, in my book.

The only lyrics that really impressed me on here were John Petrucci's "Endless Sacrifice", which describes well the pain of a rockstar living away from his family. Along with the nice melody in the verse and the cool Maiden-esque part at the end, it's very touching. "Vacant" is also moving put together with the music.

So, it's not nearly my favorite DT album (that would be "Images and Words" and "Awake"), but it's definitely worth buying if you're a fan. I wouldn't really recommend starting with this album though, check out the aforementioned two first.

I first heard DT back in the early 90's when the only saving grace to the crap hairband stuff coming out was Marillion. I really remember how impressed I was with the playing ability of the band - from musicianship standpoint they were just amazing. But I really was annoyed with how they took the crap cheezy hairband melodies and then inserted the brilliance... I gave that album away since I couldnt listen to the whole thing just the instrumental sections.

Ok, so flash forward to 2003 and I read a guy's post on a PF here at work:

DT does kinda go back to the NuMetal genre to grab the heavy grooves and chunka chunka guitar sounds that are so popular, but I dont think Limp Dickstick or others in that genre could ever put together a NuMetal song in 12/8 or mixed time sigs that DT succeeds in doing. Yes it's a bit derivative but they take it and extend it past anything out there right now. LaBrie's vocals were always a source of issue with me just because they're too pretty for the music, but with the production they definitely have grown on me. He's tried to toughen them up and for the most part succeeded. Especially the layered minor 7th and minor 3rd harmonies a la Alice In Chains, LaBrie is finally coming up to the rest of the band in his presentation. To be succinct: John Petrucci is just freaking amazing!! With sections where Portnoy and Myung are right in the speed metal groove a la Master of Puppets and Kill Them All, Petrucci just flies on the guitar making everyone else in metal look to be a pale pretender to the craft. I wish I could play like that but I would need about 10 cups of coffee every hour just to hit that intensity level.

Portnoy and Myung are typically brilliant, with Portnoy playing that big huge stupid work of art Siamese Monster kit of his and Myung chugging out ripping bass work supporting Petrucci and Rudess. You cant have a decent piece of music without solid rhythm track, and these guys give it everything and more.

Probably the only criticism I could have would be Jordan Rudess' playing seems hidden by the fact that his lead key sounds all sound like guitar - too close to Petrucci's sound to make it out on first listen. But after a few listens I found to my astonishment that what I thought were guitar lines were key solos and ... well that's all needs be said.

Bottom line: excellent musicianship, only one song seems weaker than the rest otherwise a brilliant concept album from start to finish. Any Prog Rock or Metal freak needs this in their collection.

Dream Theater are a musical anomoly. I believe it is repeating this article of truth that one needs to put this disc into their cd player. The first, and most obvious thing about this album is that it is a touch (a touch?) heavier than previous releases. Unfortunately, that seems to be enough for a lot of people to form an opinion of the album. But it is only when you delve further that you truly discover what the magic of Train of Thought is. Here are just a few of my thoughts on what I consider a brilliant album:

The album opens with what I would describe as a pretty conventional, not bad just conventional, track. As I Am probably fits the classic sense of a rock song closer than anything recorded by DT up until this point. There are some famtastic displays of chops metered with remarkable conrol and retraint by all instrumentalists.

This Dying Soul is a great piece of music, from the layered guitar harmonies to the complexity of the changes within the song. On this track Petrucci shows the value of playing a measured solo over firing off 16 notes per beat. Even during the solos no member of the band becomes bigger than the rest, resulting in the PERFECT band arrangement. But the album only gets better...

Endless Sacrifice is fairly similar to This Dying Soul. I am not too sure whether this was intended or not, but knowing DT it was! I don't mean that they carry the same melody or lyrical content or anything like that, just that when I think of those songs I automatically think of them as a pair. (Probably Live at Budokan's fault!)

Honor Thy Father is the only track that I truly consider weak on the album. I really enjoy the verse because it is so different to anything I've ever heard from these guys. (Bit like Tool almost?) Therein lies the potential that the song had. Where the song falls down is with a poor chorus. Even the break between the verse and chorus is something akin to hitting a brick wall, or changing the disc halfway through a song. There does not seem to be any logical movement between the verse and chorus. Anyway enough about that track.

From here on the album more than recovers with the last 3 tracks being my favourites on the album.

Vacant is a haunting piece of music complete with cello to really paint a dark picture. The impressive working of the melody on the piano is done to perfection by an ever-magnificent Jordan Rudess. It only become truly impressive upon hearing Stream of Consciousness when you realise that they took the 5/4 melody from that and turned it into a 6/8 (which I'll admit is pretty difficult to hear until you hear the give-away swing of compound time that James La Brie's voice gives it.)

On Stream of Consciousness James gets a break and the instruments go to town! This is for me the most impressive track on the album. In classic DT fashion it moves from time signature to time signature (at some points 3 measures in a row can have 3 different time signatures!) The highlight of the piece is Jordan's classically-inspired solo at the end of the song into his harmony with John Petrucci who's tone is as always nothing short of beautiful.

In the Name of God is GRAND. This is what prog rock is. (OK maybe a little heavier than most but the elements are all there!) As proven on Live at Budokan this is the song to close a concert with. The technical chops shown by John, John, Mike and Jordan are mind-numbing! In this context the highlight of the entire album is the solo jam at around 9 minutes with Jordan and John P trading extremely fast licks (John ripping out serious tremelo picking, and Jordan growing an extra 5 fingers to play at that speed!) All the while John M and Mike are locked into their funky (not too technically challenging but still a fantastic display of rhythm section dynamics) groove and don't miss a beat.

Each musician's performance on this album is HUGE. It is easy to see James, John P. and Jordan's contributions because they are evident, but this in no way means that Mike and John M. had a smaller role to play. Myung's bass playing is something phenominal. His ability to lock into a groove yet still play lines that create beautiful countermelodies is unbelievable. Mike can play any time signature as though it was a basic 4/4. In Stream of Consciousness you almost can't detect the obscure time signatures since he just plays through them beautifully (and never steamrolls his way through them as so many drummers can be guilty of in those circumstances.)

In conclusion this is an album by a band that streches itself more with each album they release (One song can be more adventurous than other well-known bands will be their entire careers) This album is a must for anybody who wants to experience a band that is never content to rest on its laurels. As I finish this review the CD rips into the jam at the end of "In the Name of God" so the last thing to be said is that this album can only be experienced by owning it and not by reading my review - so why are you still reading? Go get it!

I will say this again, as I've said before:

Portnoy's lyrics are horrible. Dreadful. Obviously he's STILL writing to fill the void left by Kevin Moore, who is surely missed - at the very least in the lyrical department.

I agree with most of the reviewers that outline the overall "lack" that this CD has - melody, cohesiveness, etc. And it's sad. Apparently they peaked at "Awake" ... the last song that was a true masterpiece was "Scarred" ... though "Trial of Tears" (off, yes, FII) is great in it's own right.

I'm giving them one last shot before they drop off the must-buy on release day list. Please don't let me down again, DT. Take some time, recharge the batteries, and get back to writing some musical AND lyrical classics once again.