Dream of Mirrors

How good is Dream of Mirrors on a scale of 1-10?


  • Total voters
    33
I must say, I find "Dream of mirrors" actually the worst track of the album. It has a charming melody and the chorus is okay, but it is WAY too long. It just doesn't cut cake for me. I like the melody of the verses, but that's all. I find even "The fallen angel" better than this song. Seriously.

I know everyone has his own taste, but that's my take on this song. It's not that bad, but that's all.
 
Great melodies all over the place.Great vocals.Too much repetition and yet again a very poor arrangement.Very boring.
 
Like many of you have pointed out, Janick Gers have written one epic song on all 4 (5 :p) reunion albums, and they have all been really good! While I don't think this is as good as the other epics, this one is still a great one!

After the unexpected and loud opening, the song starts of quiet and slowly builds. The music feels like it is more in the background for the first part of the song, and Bruces vocals are the Centro-point, and as the rest of the album, Bruce does a fantastic delivery. The verses are great and the chorus is huge. One good detail is the snare that comes on at 4:13, reinforces the feeling that the song builds. The tempo changes and that's when the song really takes of. The fast verse at 5:58 as powerful, and so are the fast chorus and solo that follows.

Maybe the song drags a little bit thou, and cutting away one minute shouldn't hurt the song. But it is on the other hand it's nice that the song have time to breath and build, the payoff when the song reaches its climax is better.

8/10
 
Another Aspergers observation. I like this because I didn't even realise that I used to view everything in a very black and white way. I wasn't until I started reading about autism that I was like, "Oh that's what I've been doing, that's why people think I'm straight laced. That's why other people don't have as rigid a world view as me."

I mellowed as I got older, or I gained more life experience and broadened my horizons, met people who saw things differently to me, but I love the dreaming in black and white line. Nevermind dreaming in black and white, I used to live in black and white. My greatest problem over the years has definately been myself.

I love the vocals on this too. Just perfect.
 
I wouldn't say this was a great song, but it definitely has something about it, as I sing and hum the melodies A LOT, particularly the intro.
 
This is one song that's only just clicked with me. When I first listened to it when I started to listen to Maiden, I disliked the intro, it just felt disjointed. And as a result, I never gave it my full attention until I watched Rock In Rio once again about a month ago. My god, I don't know what happened but it gave me chills, particuarly the final "oh oh" section.

Crackin' track!
 
A good song, with some really wonderful parts to it, but doesn't always hold my interest. And the lyrics...
7/10
 
I only dream in black and white, I only dream cause I'm alive
I only dream in black and white, to save me from myself

Do you dream in black and white? If so, the chances are you are over 55 and were brought up watching a monochrome television set.

Eva Murzyn, a psychology student at Dundee University who carried out the study, said: "It is a fascinating hypothesis.
"It suggests there could be a critical period in our childhood when watching films has a big impact on the way dreams are formed
.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/sci...ite-TV-generation-have-monochrome-dreams.html

:p
 
The big epic of the album and Janick's first experiment with a more acoustic driven tune. Starting off immediately with Bruce singing is a unique way to do it, but it works great. I love the acoustic work during the verses combined with the steady bass gallop. Creates a really tense mood that finally resolves with the pre chorus. Love the melody there. The verse repeats but they've added some parts to maintain the momentum of the song. At the 3 minute mark the song finally reaches its climax and it's incredibly satisfying. But it turns out the song is still building up. I really love that slow build that engulfs the entire song. It keeps things exciting for the entire near 10 minutes, which is not an easy feat. One of my favorite Maiden choruses. Love when the tempo picks up with the guitar harmony and the "lost" section. Great Bruce performance there. Another bit that is reminsicent of the previous album, but I can't imagine Blaze doing it justice the way Bruce does. Also love Nicko's performance on this. And of course another great "woah oh oh" section.

Great epic.

10
 
Amazing song. Great lyrics, and amazing soloing. I wish the "Have you ever felt..." and "The dream is true" vocals were removed, as I find the what the guitars are doing more interesting in those parts. Doesn't really detract from the song though. 10/10
 
Gers Epic #1. Is it as good as the four that follow? Probably not, but it's still a monster. This track grabbed me as a kid and has held on. I still mark out every time it hits. Logically, I want to give this a 9 - there's more repetition within, the complexity level skyrockets for the two superlative Gers epic tracks, but I prefer it to both The Legacy and The Talisman. 10.
 
Didn't like this at first and I still dislike the intro. But the rest of it has really grown on me. The bridge section is absolutely superb with a great melody and choppy riffs. The chorus is emphatic too with a really intriguing lyric. And the sped up chorus is a nice idea too.

8
 
The intro is quite noisy, but when we get past it the song gets really, really good. I did like this song better a few years ago though. This is probably Janick's weakest epic, which says a lot about his songwriting skills.

8/10
 
10/10

Dream of Mirrors is the longest epic and most progressive song on the album. No punches are pulled introducing the track. Bruce wails away with the full band from the get-go, allowing the first half of the song to pull back and slowly build itself up into a brilliant slab of dynamics, tempo shifts, and time changes. The lyrics are impressive in their stark simplicity, discussing man’s inability to truly understand or alter the course of dreams. It’s almost the sequel to Seventh Son’s Infinite Dreams and even shares some almost identical lyrics. Dream of Mirrors is a slow build that eventually pays off with a rollicking bridge. Just when the song should end it gets a million times better by introducing the traditional Maiden gallop. Bruce channels his voice circa Somewhere in Time during the “Lost!” sections. Janick’s solo is once again spellbinding. It’s a dramatic tour de force.
 
This song is supposedly 21st century Infinite Dreams. Well all I know is that Infinite Dreams is a much better song than this. This one just feels so weak and mediocre, not very inspiring or epic. It's a dream about fucking mirrors. What the hell is that supposed to mean? No, I'm not doing it. No, no, no. 4.5/10 is the highest I'm willing to give it.

And then that chorus comes in.

Goddamn.

One of Maiden's all-time greatest choruses. It's 10/10 plain and simple. If only the rest of the song was as good as that chorus is.

Onto the solo, it's fairly good, a strong 7/10 certainly, and then the song does THAT CHORUS again and then it ends on a meh note.

Fuck. What rating do I give the damn thing? I'm gonna average it up. 4.5 + 10 + 7 = 7.16666667

So I'm going with 7/10. The song is mediocre except for that goddamn chorus. That is just spectacular. The rest isn't.

Fucking hell.
 
And here we've come to my first 10 for this album (got 2 to give out). This is another song that, just like the title track, starts off just as if it were a lullaby (disregarding the first 20 seconds), and the "lullaby" serves as the basis to pretty much the entire song (except for the instrumental section). That's what makes this song so unique—it's a heavy metal lullaby. It features some of the best lyrics on the album and one of the best instrumentals, too. The faster bit when Bruce starts to agressively sing "LOST in a dream of mirrors" reminds me a bit of Blind Guardian for some reason, and I like that, it's not the kind of stuff I would expect from Maiden. Overall, a genius masterpiece.
 
I’d like to give this song a 10, but I’ve got to agree that the intro is a bit annoying, and I turn down my volume a bit every time, so I must take it into consideration. The rest of the song is still amazing though. 9/10
 
An awkward vocal intro leads into a soft, moody verse that sounds great. An appealing pre-chorus leads into a sedate chorus 1.

Another verse, and then the heaviness kicks up a notch for the pre-chorus before breaking into a pretty good chorus 2 and another flirtation with chorus 1.

A more drum-forward verse heads into an even heavier pre-chorus and chorus 2, then into a pretty good aggressive bridge. So far, so good.

Wait a minute, now we're back to chorus 2, but the tempo is cranked way up. This doesn't sound very good. A decent interlude with "whoah-ohs" leads into an OK solo and back into the interlude before returning to a normal-speed chorus 2 and chorus 1 to wrap things up.

I really appreciate the odd structure and what they were attempting to do here, and parts of the song sound undeniably great; unfortunately, some other parts don't work very well. This could have been a pretty special song, but as it stands it's a 7/10.
 
Back
Top