Dream Theater

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Detective Beauregard said:
Peoria is a relatively small city about 2 hours southwest of Chicago, and it makes zero sense why they'd book a show there and in Chicago. I completely agree with you -- on a tour like this that will draw many fans, they shouldn't be leaving any major US city out.
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This is true. To be fair, Illinois is a big ass state and having 2 Illinois shows isn't crazy, but Peoria makes no sense considering they aren't doing an Iowa or St. Louis show. If you're gonna do a "southern Illinois" show you should do Champaign/Urbana or just say fuck it and do St. Louis. Their itinerary for the Midwest is very silly, take a look:

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Why wouldn't you go Wichita > St. Louis OR Des Moines > Chicago > Cincinnati? The way they're doing it has them driving Northeast to Chicago just to go IMMEDIATELY BACK the way they came to get to Peoria. It just doesn't make any damn sense.
 

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I have a question for the musicians here. Can anyone here play an entire DT song start to finish, note for note? I'm close on Caught in a Web for guitar.
 
I can do a few of them. I don't know if a lot of what Petrucci plays is especially difficult as much as it just takes a lot of practice. It isn't like Tosin Abasi type stuff where you really need to work the techniques required to play it. Petrucci has a fairly standard playing style.
 
It's definitely a bit difficult. I mostly played just Iron Maiden and Metallica stuff for the longest time, so this is a bit of a step up. I can play bits and pieces of DT's stuff, but not a full song yet. I just need to nail the middle section of Caught in a Web and then I'll be able to play the whole thing note for note. Learning to Live is pretty easy too, but that has stuff that's very Maidenish.
 
It's hard to learn a DT song from beginning to end as there is usually a difficult solo or rhythm section to overcome. The one I'm proudest of learning is The Count of Tuscany, which I can play note for note except for the ending of the third and last solo because I can't sweep for crap. Strange Deja Vu and The Looking Glass are also playable although the latter has a similar problem in the solo.
 
Now that I think of it TCOT might be one of the easier ones to learn as there's nothing that's absolutely near impossible, that last solo definitely sounds pretty insane though. Another easy few are probably The Bigger Picture, Pull Me Under, Endless Sacrifice (apart from the solos), Most songs from The Astonishing.
 
Saapanael said:
It's hard to learn a DT song from beginning to end as there is usually a difficult solo or rhythm section to overcome.
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The way I see it, most DT songs only have a few of those sections. Obviously there are songs like The Dance of Eternity or Dark Eternal Night which are filled with them, but the majority of their material isn't that way. Take a song like Octavarium for example. It's very long but the only particularly challenging part (IMO) is the instrumental section, and even that isn't among their more difficult instrumentals.

I've actually had more difficulties attempting music by Symphony X. Romeo's guitar parts are way more involved and are a constant barrage of technical riffing and shredding. Also lots of tapping and sweep picking, which I'm not very good at. I'm more of an alternate picker which gives me an advantage with DT because Petrucci alt picks a lot.
 
Collin said:
I have a question for the musicians here. Can anyone here play an entire DT song start to finish, note for note? I'm close on Caught in a Web for guitar.
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I can probably play about 25% to one-third of their entire catalog on bass... meaning mostly the ballads and stuff. However, I've never really tried. I can play 99% of Train of Thought, though (minus the stupid circus crap in the middle of Endless Sacrifice). I learned the entire album back in the mid-2000s because I was obsessed with it. Those runs in Honor Thy Father and In the Name of God took forever to learn.

Congrats on Caught in a Web, by the way. That middle chromatic section is insanely fun and one of the catchiest sections on Awake.

Mosh said:
I've actually had more difficulties attempting music by Symphony X. Romeo's guitar parts are way more involved and are a constant barrage of technical riffing and shredding. Also lots of tapping and sweep picking, which I'm not very good at. I'm more of an alternate picker which gives me an advantage with DT because Petrucci alt picks a lot.
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Romeo is insane. I still can't figure out how he does "easy" patterned stuff like the Sea of Lies interlude, yet alone throwing it willy-nilly into solos. Although I do think that my favorite solo of his (Accolade II) is relatively "easy."

Props to LePond, too. That dude is a criminally underrated bassist in a band where everyone primarily worships the vocals and guitar playing.

Overall I think that Symphony X is more difficult to play a consistent basis than Dream Theater because their crazy parts are spread throughout their entire songs whereas Dream Theater gets insane for the big instrumental sections but keeps it pretty straightforward for the other parts.
 
Detective Beauregard said:
Overall I think that Symphony X is more difficult to play a consistent basis than Dream Theater because their crazy parts are spread throughout their entire songs whereas Dream Theater gets insane for the big instrumental sections but keeps it pretty straightforward for the other parts.
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Exactly the point I was making. When learning a DT song, I end up zeroing in on tiny fragments. With Symphony X I hardly know where to start because it's all stuff I need to slow down and work on.
 
Collin said:
Now that I think of it TCOT might be one of the easier ones to learn as there's nothing that's absolutely near impossible, that last solo definitely sounds pretty insane though. Another easy few are probably The Bigger Picture, Pull Me Under, Endless Sacrifice (apart from the solos), Most songs from The Astonishing.
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"You Not Me" and "Peruvian Skies" are relatively easy too.
 
The hardest song on FII for me is actually Just Let Me Breathe. The unison on that is insane. Everything else is fairly easy.
 
Teaser for easy:

Honestly, sounds pretty good to me. Jeff Scott Soto has definitely lowered his range over the years, but I'm curious to hear this.
 
@Mosh ,

You find or receive any information about the presale in Denver for tomorrow yet? I have nada for Houston presale tomorrow. Ticketmaster does not even list the show. Normally Live Nation sends me presale info ahead of time but not for this one. The auditorium website shows the presale is tomorrow, but is this a presale only for official DT fan club members?
 
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