Your Controversial Opinions on DT

[adastra]

Stellar? Gotta love the diversity of DT's fans!

:3  Even though our opinions differ, We still are one big family 

At Helsinki M&G i'm gonna bring my JPM for Petrucci to sign.  I'm gonna try to talk him into guessing which one it is (when it still still in the guitar case).. If he gets it wrong, They'll have to play You Not Me.. Let's see if Petrucci has enough balls to take the bet!

[BlobVanDam]

Somehow I doubt they'll be basing their future setlists off bets with fans, but let us know how that goes.

I think it's a rule that there has to be that one guy at every M&G getting their JP guitar signed.

[adastra]

Somehow I doubt they'll be basing their future setlists off bets with fans, but let us know how that goes.

I think it's a rule that there has to be that one guy at every M&G getting their JP guitar signed.

Haha  
If he is hesitant in taking the bet , I'm gonna start the usual "oh... ok... If you are too scared." -thing

[Enalya]

Haha  
If he is hesitant in taking the bet , I'm gonna start the usual "oh... ok... If you are too scared." -thing

Then you do have balls I wouldn't dare haha. Let us know how it went!

[GasparXR]

Haha, I can see JP saying "if someone's going to play it, it's going to be you not me." You know, since you have the guitar and all.

[JayOctavarium]

Admit it... if Dream Theater decided to bust YNM out at a show... totally unexpected.... we'd all be singing it.

[BlobVanDam]

Admit it... if Dream Theater decided to bust YNM out at a show... totally unexpected.... we'd all be singing it.

I'd be surprised if most people here even knew the lyrics!

I wouldn't be singing along, but it would be an amusing experience. When they played PoW at the last Sydney show, I was dancing like a tard and having a great time. Sometimes you just have to make the most of it.

[Zook]

If Maiden can make me sing along to No More Lies, DT can do it for You Not Me. The song isn't bad anyway.

Still, when they did play it, it just sounded like the studio version with James' less than stellar vocals, so it doesn't translate well live.

[RodrigoAltaf]

I forgot this even existed - live version of You Not Me. And I thought the version of Blind Faith on Chaos in Motion had crappY vocals...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufTUp3uGmcA

[BlobVanDam]

I didn't realize JLB would be singing the octave higher melody, but it was just out of his comfortable range. Aside from his vocals, it worked better than I expected live, and the chorus harmonies were done pretty well from JP/MP's side.

[RodrigoAltaf]

I didn't realize JLB would be singing the octave higher melody, but it was just out of his comfortable range.

Yeah, that was a bad choice of vocal arrangement. Aside from that, a solid version. I wouldn´t mind hearing it live, even though I prefer You Or Me.

[GasparXR]

I didn't find it absolutely terrible on vocals, but it was during JLB's low point and wasn't great. If they performed it now, it would probably would sound better, and JLB might do the next harmony down to make it a little bit more comfortable.

[SeRoX]

Vocals are OK but I lol'd when he sings like "it's all about yooaaaaahh not meeeaohhh" A bit rough.

[adastra]

I'm sure that people would go absolutely nuts wheb hearing the opening riff of YNM !

[JayOctavarium]

Admit it... if Dream Theater decided to bust YNM out at a show... totally unexpected.... we'd all be singing it.

I'd be surprised if most people here even knew the lyrics!

I wouldn't be singing along, but it would be an amusing experience. When they played PoW at the last Sydney show, I was dancing like a tard and having a great time. Sometimes you just have to make the most of it.

Don't worry. At the time, PoW was the highlight of the show for me (PN09 was my first Dream Theater live experience)

If Maiden can make me sing along to No More Lies, DT can do it for You Not Me. The song isn't bad anyway.

Hey now... I love No More Lies...

I forgot this even existed - live version of You Not Me. And I thought the version of Blind Faith on Chaos in Motion had crappY vocals...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufTUp3uGmcA

Thanks for this!

[?]

I forgot this even existed - live version of You Not Me. And I thought the version of Blind Faith on Chaos in Motion had crappY vocals...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufTUp3uGmcA

Wow, that was not one of James' strongest performances...

[robwebster]

Admit it... if Dream Theater decided to bust YNM out at a show... totally unexpected.... we'd all be singing it.

I'd be surprised if most people here even knew the lyrics!

I wouldn't be singing along, but it would be an amusing experience. When they played PoW at the last Sydney show, I was dancing like a tard and having a great time. Sometimes you just have to make the most of it.

Don't worry. At the time, PoW was the highlight of the show for me (PN09 was my first Dream Theater live experience)

I've just been listening to Prophets of War. It's ridiculously good fun. Flabby, towards, the end, but there's a great five-minute song in there, and it must be incredible live. That's one I'm gutted we've never yet got live footage of. A gem waiting to be found. You Not Me's not nearly as bad as its bogeyman reputation, either. It's listenable, enjoyable, singable. It's not poetry, but I think there's an extent to which YNM's probably a victim of the online echo chamber. Mild disdain gets repeated, and amplified, and exaggerated, until it becomes caricatured as this incredible burden that the discography would be better off without. It's not - that solo is great, the riff at the end is badass. I'm not convinced it's the worst song in their catalogue. I'm not even convinced it's the worst song on Falling Into Infinity.

I'm onto The Ministry of Lost Souls, now. This must be my first time hearing Ministry in well over a year. I rarely sit down and just listen to music any more. Christ, it's ages since I listened to Systematic Chaos start to finish. The second half of the album does lose momentum, but it's easy to forget that it's still kind of thoroughly brilliant. Such a good song. And the best song title in the DT discography. That transition's great, too. You know the one. With the drums. It's like getting swept into the river Styx, it's ace. I love that transition.

[JayOctavarium]

The only thing about PoW that was a let down was the fact that MP's vocal section was sampled

[robwebster]

Right, here's mine. In the Presence of Enemies shouldn't be a song. It should be three. How much better is this Systematic Chaos:

1. Resurrection
2. Forsaken
3. Constant Motion
4. The Dark Eternal Night
5. Heretic
6. Prophets of War
7. Repentance
8. The Reckoning
9. The Ministry of Lost Souls

ItPoE-1 was very lucky to get split off, because it works so much better alone. Heretic didn't have the same fortune, because it's the best and weirdest DT single that never was. It's huge, that chorus fills the room. Take the edge off a little (only a little) of the Dark Master stuff, chuck in a solo, and that's a wonderful single.

Same goes for A Nightmare to Remember. I'd Hell's Kitchen the shit out of that bad boy. See also --

1. A Bullet from the Night
2. A Rite of Passage
3. Beautiful Agony
4. The Shattered Fortress
5. Wither
6. The Best of Times
7. The Count of Tuscany

BA would've been the standout, from that album. I post it every time it comes up, (which is a lot, I'm nothing if not repetitious,) but here it is again. The best DT song that never quite lived.

[jakepriest]

Right, here's mine. In the Presence of Enemies shouldn't be a song. It should be three.

No. It's perfect as a song.

[robwebster]

Perfect is a very strong word.

[KevShmev]

And incorrect in this case.

Like you, rob, I think Part I is great, but Part II is a mixed bag; it has some good stuff and it has some stuff that, well, could have been a lot better. 

[Jaffa]

I think there's an extent to which YNM's probably a victim of the online echo chamber. Mild disdain gets repeated, and amplified, and exaggerated, until it becomes caricatured as this incredible burden that the discography would be better off without.

I just want to take a moment to appreciate this gem of wisdom.  I'm not a big fan of YNM, myself, but the principle here is dead on, and 'online echo chamber' is the best term I've ever seen used to describe it. 

[425]

I'll take up the task of defending Nightmare, then. The midsection needs to be in the middle of that song because it's part of the story arc. It needs to be there just as much as Another World needs to be in A Change of Seasons, which isn't nearly as cohesive (or as good) a song as Nightmare (I realize that that statement is not at all relevant, I just like to anger people). Without each other, the midsection is a moderately strong ballad (only moderately because it's not really close to being a complete song on its own, at least by DT standards), and the rest of the song is a moderately strong prog metal song. Together, A Nightmare to Remember is a genius epic that boasts an incredible dramatic arc and is simply one of the very best songs in the band's entire discography.

This is not at all comparable to Hell's Kitchen/Burning My Soul, where those two were kind of duct taped together. Hell's Kitchen served no purpose to the dramatic arc of Burning My Soul and was just sort of a random and unnecessary four minute buildup into the final verse and chorus. The midsection is completely necessary to A Nightmare to Remember's dramatic arc. For one thing, without it, Nightmare is a 13-minute, straight-ahead metal song. Can anyone name a single instance of that working well? The only quiet moments, in that instance, would be like a 20 second piano intro and another 20 second keyboard bit later. It also irreparably damages the song vocally and lyrically, because you lose out on the contrast between the "weird trippy hospital scene" and the big, emotional "dealing with the psychological impacts of the accident" scene. This is true just in terms of vocal style as well as in the lyrics. Without the midsection, you're going from a very heavy operatic/gruff vocal section into a very very heavy, very gruff vocal section. That's not much of a contrast compared to going from heavy operatic/gruff into soft, somewhat trippy into very very heavy, very gruff. Taking out the midsection just kills "Day after day," and, though I know that so many people dislike it, that section does not deserve to be killed.

All my stuff about working with the dramatic arc actually apply moderately well to ITPOE, which I think works better as one song, but I would not go so far as to say that it is "perfect" (I wouldn't even say that about ANTR), and it's certainly not nearly as good in my estimation as Nightmare at providing a dramatic arc.


But I do agree, Rob, with approximately everything you said about You Not Me.

[Jaffa]

Yeah, I've never quite understood why people think it would be a good idea to split up ANTR.  I mean, opinions are opinions, fair enough, but for me, Beautiful Agony isn't nearly as beautiful without the surrounding heaviness and chaos of the rest of the song.  I've listened to the version rob just linked, and it's good, it's a great ballad in its own right, but I think it is infinitely more powerful in the context of ANTR. 

[Outcrier]

The intro to ACOS alone is more inspired than the entire ANTR itself but i think i posted this in the wrong thread since this is the controversial opinions one 

[425]

For that, I'm going to be a recurring nightmare haunting your dreams. There's no way you can prepare for what will happen next.

[Outcrier]

Taking advantage you are here, who is that in your avatar?

[425]

Bruce Dickinson. It's from the Satellite 15 intro video that Iron Maiden used on their Final Frontier Tour.

[Outcrier]

Yeah, i thought it was Dickinson, the guy looked exactly like him 

[425]

I thought it was a fantastic video so I did a screengrab to use it as my avatar for an Iron Maiden forum I joined, and I just used it here because it's such a great avatar IMO, even though I rarely listen to Maiden anymore (which is probably something I need to rectify).

[robwebster]

I'll take up the task of defending Nightmare, then. The midsection needs to be in the middle of that song because it's part of the story arc. It needs to be there just as much as Another World needs to be in A Change of Seasons, which isn't nearly as cohesive (or as good) a song as Nightmare (I realize that that statement is not at all relevant, I just like to anger people). Without each other, the midsection is a moderately strong ballad (only moderately because it's not really close to being a complete song on its own, at least by DT standards), and the rest of the song is a moderately strong prog metal song. Together, A Nightmare to Remember is a genius epic that boasts an incredible dramatic arc and is simply one of the very best songs in the band's entire discography.

This is not at all comparable to Hell's Kitchen/Burning My Soul, where those two were kind of duct taped together. Hell's Kitchen served no purpose to the dramatic arc of Burning My Soul and was just sort of a random and unnecessary four minute buildup into the final verse and chorus. The midsection is completely necessary to A Nightmare to Remember's dramatic arc. For one thing, without it, Nightmare is a 13-minute, straight-ahead metal song. Can anyone name a single instance of that working well? The only quiet moments, in that instance, would be like a 20 second piano intro and another 20 second keyboard bit later. It also irreparably damages the song vocally and lyrically, because you lose out on the contrast between the "weird trippy hospital scene" and the big, emotional "dealing with the psychological impacts of the accident" scene. This is true just in terms of vocal style as well as in the lyrics. Without the midsection, you're going from a very heavy operatic/gruff vocal section into a very very heavy, very gruff vocal section. That's not much of a contrast compared to going from heavy operatic/gruff into soft, somewhat trippy into very very heavy, very gruff. Taking out the midsection just kills "Day after day," and, though I know that so many people dislike it, that section does not deserve to be killed.

First off -

::: For one thing, without it, Nightmare is a 13-minute, straight-ahead metal song. Can anyone name a single instance of that working well?
The Glass Prison.

Moving on! I'm not pitching a song that just blanks straight across, I'm pitching a rather more heavy-duty arrangement. I think a lot of the second half is a little flabby. I agree that the "night after night" bit is a lot better than it's given credit for, and that impact would be lessened without the soft section... but the lyrics don't quite match the music, and I think it's a victim of its own ambition. I think, in paring A Nightmare to Remember down to its core elements, you can create two songs that stand strong alone rather than two that sound a little funky together. I get what you're saying about the story, but the way they sit at the moment is a little bit oil and water.

I think, if the song's two identities had a little more in the way of common ground, I'd go easier. It's definitely possible to switch from hard to soft to hard again. Just ask my first wife! You mention the lyrics, but I think the lyrics are the only thing that bring the Jekyll and the Hyde together, and they were the last thing to fit in - and, hence, eminently changeable. A few moments of unity would have made a world of difference. That piano motif could've been a good place to start - the one the song begins with. Work that into Beautiful Agony and you're starting to build a bit of cohesion, but I think it would've taken another week or so in the studio. I adore Beautiful Agony as a stand-alone song, whereas I think A Nightmare to Remember is good in parts - a bit of a curate's egg. I also firmly believe brevity is wit, (not that you'd tell from my posts!) and everything can always be tighter, so I think evicting Beautiful Agony would be more of an opportunity than a sacrifice.

Actually, I can do that, can't I? I might play about with the stems. This will be messy!

All my stuff about working with the dramatic arc actually apply moderately well to ITPOE, which I think works better as one song, but I would not go so far as to say that it is "perfect" (I wouldn't even say that about ANTR), and it's certainly not nearly as good in my estimation as Nightmare at providing a dramatic arc.

I think you can still have ItPoE's arc spread out throughout the album. The second half of Awake forms an arc, musically, and it's got Lifting Shadows off a Dream wedged into the middle of it. Heck, they had an arc split across an entire decade. There's no reason you can't maintain the story and the flow of ItPoE while standing each movement alone as its own episode. I think an episodic feel would've actually been spot on within the context of Systematic Chaos. The whole disc's got that comic book feel, and I think you could tidy it up without sacrificing any of that great music.



More controversial opinions, as I trudge through the discography in no real order.

Honor thy Father might be the most underappreciated song in the band's history. Brutally heavy, but gorgeously melodic, full of progressive witchcraft, it strikes a stellar balance. The "Expecting everyone to bow and kiss your feet" verse might be the highlight of the album, for me. I think the uncharacteristically angry lyrics might be a bit too bitter for some people, but it's not even like Never Enough where the lyrics are a source of constant grumbling. (Those lyrics are properly hilarious nowadays. "What would you say if I walked away," indeed! Fucking hell.) But HTF is a song I never really hear anything about, positive or negative. It's one of the last ones I'd remember, but I always have a great time.

(Also, WRT Never Enough, that song is bloody brilliant, too. Not a top drawer song, but one of Mike Portnoy's best performances - his drumming is so musical, start to finish. The Muse thing gets it a lot of flack, but... hey, I like Muse!)

[425]

First off -

::: For one thing, without it, Nightmare is a 13-minute, straight-ahead metal song. Can anyone name a single instance of that working well?
The Glass Prison.

Touché. Still, I don't think Nightmare minus the midsection would work too well.

Moving on! I'm not pitching a song that just blanks straight across, I'm pitching a rather more heavy-duty arrangement. I think a lot of the second half is a little flabby. I agree that the "night after night" bit is a lot better than it's given credit for, and that impact would be lessened without the soft section... but the lyrics don't quite match the music, and I think it's a victim of its own ambition. I think, in paring A Nightmare to Remember down to its core elements, you can create two songs that stand strong alone rather than two that sound a little funky together. I get what you're saying about the story, but the way they sit at the moment is a little bit oil and water.

I think the second half is the only part of the song that comes close to excessive, but it think it's actually good as is.

And I do think the lyrics of "Day after day" match the music. I think the issue that people tend to run into there, and it's an understandable one, is putting the emphasis on "Everyone survived" instead of the entire rest of the passage. The passage is about the psychological aftermath of the accident. Most of it is very dark; it's quite an emotionally intense experience Petrucci is describing, especially for a young boy.

Day after day
And night after night
Replaying the events
Did they ever see the red light?
Over and over
Scene by scene
Like a recurring nightmare
Haunting my dreams
How could you prepare
For what would happen next?
No son should ever have to see his father such a mess
It's a miracle he lived
It's a blessing no one died
By the grace of God above
Everyone survived

Most of the passage is about how psychologically damaged he is by the accident and how awful it was for him as a child. Only at the very end does the light at the end of the tunnel come when John tells us that everyone survived. But even that isn't exactly a happy ending—he goes out of his way to tell us how much of a miracle it is that no one died, which implies that they were injured very badly. The last two lines should be read with emphasis on "by the grace of God above" instead of on "Everyone survived"—if only because Mike shows us that the outcome is closer to the negative than to the positive interpretation with his vocal style.

I think, if the song's two identities had a little more in the way of common ground, I'd go easier. It's definitely possible to switch from hard to soft to hard again. Just ask my first wife! You mention the lyrics, but I think the lyrics are the only thing that bring the Jekyll and the Hyde together, and they were the last thing to fit in - and, hence, eminently changeable. A few moments of unity would have made a world of difference. That piano motif could've been a good place to start - the one the song begins with. Work that into Beautiful Agony and you're starting to build a bit of cohesion, but I think it would've taken another week or so in the studio. I adore Beautiful Agony as a stand-alone song, whereas I think A Nightmare to Remember is good in parts - a bit of a curate's egg. I also firmly believe brevity is wit, (not that you'd tell from my posts!) and everything can always be tighter, so I think evicting Beautiful Agony would be more of an opportunity than a sacrifice.

Well, the music was written before the lyrics, of course, but that's aside from the point. I think it would be awesome if they had added a bit more of connection. I don't think there is really a good way to work the piano motif into the midsection, but I do think the last few minutes of the song, which is a lot of revisiting earlier themes, could probably have hit on some of the themes of the midsection. However, I don't think it was at all necessary for them to do this to make it feel like one song. You praised The Ministry of Lost Souls earlier in this thread. I agree with that praise—it's a top 25 song—but it's really similar to the construction of A Nightmare to Remember in a lot of ways. It's just reversed (light-heavy-light instead of heavy-light-heavy).

And the lyrical concept tying the midsection to the rest of the song is far more tenuous than for Nightmare.

Personally, for me, I think length and brevity in music... Neither is intrinsically better than the other. I think whatever best serves the purposes of the music is better. I think a particular song can be too long or too short, but I don't think long songs are by their very nature better than short songs or vice versa. This is reflected in my top 10, I think, which contains both Far From Heaven and Octavarium. My opinion is simply that Nightmare is good as a long song and that its midsection would not be nearly as good as short song as it is as part of that long song.

And I think we share a penchant for lengthy posts!

Actually, I can do that, can't I? I might play about with the stems. This will be messy!

The musical issue with doing that (the one having nothing to do with my personal judgement of the song), though, is that the midsection goes directly into the solo section and therefore Beautiful Agony as a standalone song wouldn't end properly. I don't have the stems but I did try once to make a standalone edit just to see how it sounded, and I just couldn't figure out what to do with the ending. I think I wound up fading it out, but as I recall it didn't sound too great that way (I think because I had to fade the chorus, like while they were singing).

I think you can still have ItPoE's arc spread out throughout the album. The second half of Awake forms an arc, musically, and it's got Lifting Shadows off a Dream wedged into the middle of it. Heck, they had an arc split across an entire decade. There's no reason you can't maintain the story and the flow of ItPoE while standing each movement alone as its own episode. I think an episodic feel would've actually been spot on within the context of Systematic Chaos. The whole disc's got that comic book feel, and I think you could tidy it up without sacrificing any of that great music.

I think that's an interesting idea at least, but I think if they'd have done that, I'd just have wound up wishing they'd put all the pieces together in one song. I also think that would kill the pacing that the song works so hard to achieve, particularly on the Part II upswing from Heretic to Salvation—could you imagine them splitting the song into two anywhere else other than exactly where they split it?

[robwebster]

Actually, I can do that, can't I? I might play about with the stems. This will be messy!

The musical issue with doing that (the one having nothing to do with my personal judgement of the song), though, is that the midsection goes directly into the solo section and therefore Beautiful Agony as a standalone song wouldn't end properly. I don't have the stems but I did try once to make a standalone edit just to see how it sounded, and I just couldn't figure out what to do with the ending. I think I wound up fading it out, but as I recall it didn't sound too great that way (I think because I had to fade the chorus, like while they were singing).

I'll come to the rest shortly, but first - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6E5kDU5cQQ Here you go! Not mine, regrettably. It's A Bullet from the Night I want to fiddle about with.

[425]

That's an impressive edit. I still prefer A Nightmare to Remember as a whole, but it would have been interesting if the band had done something like that and included it as bonus material.