Dream Theater

[LooseCannon]

Yeah, I thought Mike Portnoy left Dream Theater to join Avenged Sevenfold, I didn't realize Avenged Sevenfold actually stole Dream Theater's name and released an album under it.

That song is OK, definitely some nu-metalish moments, but it's mostly just boring.

 

[Mosh]

The worst thing about it is that it's the 2nd song on the album. On the Backs of Angels is such a strong opener, one of the best they've had since at least As I Am. Then you get this weird alt rock thing. I still remember the first time I heard it. Even as a pretty new DT fan, that was such a WTF moment.

Edit: This is actually a common issue on DT's recent albums. Strong opener and then a throwaway second song that attempts and fails at being a single. Forsaken and Rite of Passage have this issue too and are among the weaker DT songs. You could also go back to the 90s and look at You Not Me on Falling Into Infinity.

By comparison, The Looking Glass is the 2nd song on DT12 and it's easily one of the best songs on there. Now that was a promising way to really start the album.

 

[The Flash]

The intro to that song is pure nu-metal. It actually sounds very similar to a Linkin Park song, whose name is slipping my mind at the moment.

 

[JudasMyGuide]

Mike Portnoy left Dream Theater to join Avenged Sevenfold

 

[LooseCannon]

Well, that's what Portnoy thought.

 

[JudasMyGuide]

Yeah, that reaction was more or less to the general idea of that sentence.

Honestly, I have no idea what was Portnoy smoking at the time.

 

[Mosh]

I got the impression he was going through a really bad mid life crisis. I also think that it's not a coincidence this all started going down shortly after his dad died.

I do think he was right that DT needed a change though. Be it a break, change in personnel, or something else. I'm still not sure if I dig the new direction though. I liked DT12 a lot but I don't know if I like what Mangini brings to the band. The next album will be a make or break one for that lineup I think. Especially given the lukewarm reaction the last two albums got.

 

[JudasMyGuide]

I do think he was right that DT needed a change though. Be it a break, change in personnel, or something else. I'm still not sure if I dig the new direction though.

To this I can't help but to bump a 2 years old quote which is still my favourite post on this entire board

Also, everything post Train of Thought really overuses Portnoy's incredibly obnoxious tough guy grunt backing vocals, spoken word sections, and clips from film/tv/media/voice actors. Honestly, I think my ranking for A Dramatic Turn of Events is so high just because it's the first of four albums that doesn't sound like mathletes reciting equations while getting beat up by some college bro's in a locker room while CNN plays in the background.

 

[Night Prowler]

DREAM THEATER ANNOUNCE MOMENTOUS 2016 EUROPEAN TOUR
DEBUTING NEW ALBUM LIVE IN ITS ENTIRETY
DATES BEGIN FEBRUARY 18TH AT LONDON’S PALLADIUM
NEW ALBUM SET TO ARRIVE EARLY 2016

Roadrunner Records’ group Dream Theater has announced new tour dates for a momentous European headline run which is set to kickoff February 18th at the Palladium in London, England. The winter run will see the prog-titans delivering a one-of-a-kind set in which they will be debuting their forthcoming album live in its entirety. The unique tour is set to make stops at prestigious theaters around Europe including Amsterdam’s Carre Theater, Oslo’s Konserthus, Stockholm’s Cirkus, Paris’ Palais des Congres and Milan’s Teatro Degli Arcimboldi with additional dates to be announced (see attached itinerary). Presale tickets for select dates will be available on Wednesday, November 4th with general onsale for all dates beginning on Friday, November 6th. For up-to-the-minute news and ticket information, please visithttp://www.dreamtheater.net/tour.

The European tour comes in anticipation of Dream Theater’s forthcoming album which is expected to arrive in early 2016. The new material will follow 2013’s worldwide smash album “DREAM THEATER,” which earned a second Grammy nomination for the band, topping Billboard’s “Hard Rock Albums” while simultaneously entering at #7 on the Billboard 200. The extraordinary chart position marked the group’s third consecutive top 10 debut, and also saw "DREAM THEATER" making top 5 chart debuts in Japan, Germany, Italy, Canada, Argentina, Switzerland, Holland, and Finland, as well as top 10 debuts in Denmark, Austria, and Norway, with career high debuts in the United Kingdom and Australia. Rolling Stone touted the legendary collection as “…the birth of a new era in the band’s career.”

DREAM THEATER
EUROPEAN TOUR 2016
February 18th – March 18th
ADDITIONAL DATES TO BE ANNOUNCED

FEBRUARY

18 London, England Palladium
22 Amsterdam, Holland Carre Theater
28 Oslo, Norway Konserthus

MARCH

2 Stockholm, Sweden Cirkus
5 Paris, France Palais des Congres
6 Paris, France Palais des Congres
18 Milan, Italy Teatro Degli Arcimboldi

 

[Saapanael]

What should one expect from "additional dates to be announced"? How many and when?

 

[MrKnickerbocker]

I'd say this news all but confirms a full concept album, right?

 

[SinisterMinisterX]

Almost certainly. Last time they made "album in its entirety" the setlist for a whole tour, that album was Scenes.

 

[Mosh]

Apparently some venue websites are billing the show as "The Astonishing Live", so The Astonishing could be the album title.

 

[Mosh]

 

[Saapanael]

Dream Theater on their Facebook wall:
"And so it begins…our new album is entitled The Astonishing, and we cannot wait to share it with you early next year! In the meantime, check for new tour dates on our webpage www.dreamtheater.net/tour/"

 

[Mosh]

This will be the first DT album title that starts with the word "the". Unlike Maiden, Dream Theater very rarely starts their titles with that word.

 

[SinisterMinisterX]

Where are all the conspiracy theories?

What is that machine? Reminds me of Dave's pod from 2001.

Why are there only four eyes, with a five-man group? The guys that got Paul McCartney have gotten to Dream Theater. JOHN MYUNG IS DEAD

 

[SinisterMinisterX]

The Great Northern Empire email:

A PROCLOMATION FROM YOUR GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN

IT IS WITH THE GREAT STRENGTH born from the blood of Our Most Noble ancestral heritage, and otherworldly comfort forged by millennia of custom and tradition, in which We extend warmest of well wishes and greetings to you, Our Most Loyal Subjects, Our Beloved Citizens, O’ ye the divinely appointed tributaries flooding the lake of prosperity manifested as Our thriving metropolis, Our beacon of freedom from struggle through freedom to struggle that is The Great Northern Empire Of The Americas.

Note the continuous use of the "royal we", in the possessive. This guy thinks he owns everything.

Our thriving metropolis

Flags don't get any redder. Nor do herrings.

It is I, Lord Nafaryus, Emperor and Head of the Realm, Heir to the Mantle of Makers, Supplier of sustenance, Giver of purpose and reason, who hereby directly addresses you, Our blessed engines of productivity, you keepers of harmony, and collective responsibility, with the loving guidance We enduringly provide through the firm hand of Royal might.

Lord Nefarious has opened the Cheese Shop! This album could leave us longing for the lyrical depth of "The Count of Tuscany".

As the NOMACS who tirelessly serve and protect you transmit Our message ever so wondrously across the Realm, utilizing the arcane technology embedded deeply into the flesh during the Forbidden Ages memorialized in the electronic tablets protected by Our Grace in Our Palatial Residence, We command you to exercise the utmost caution.

What's the plan for the tablets? Sent out to fans who win a contest? Distribute to concert attendees to pick the setlist live as the show progresses?

From the perch of protective power of New Maineland, which freed you from the terror and tyranny of surrounding barbarism so many generations ago, We have learned there are those among you harvesting seeds of dissent, designed to undermine your very way of life. Do you not stride with confidence, secure in your collaboration toward the greater good defined in your servitude to the collective? Are you not given purpose by your powerlessness, freed from the burdens of choice and reason, blessed by Our decrees?

Do not be deceived by those who speak of new wonders born of “sound,” as this is the work of devilish malcontents whose search for wisdom will result only in ignorance. The NOMACS have secured you just as your daily work has defined you. FEAR and BEWARE the destabilization of our most hallowed traditions that have kept you safe and serene.

Rest assured, in Our ceaseless task of providing for your happiness as you provide for Our sustenance, Our subjects of this Realm, and the dominions thereunto belonging, are bound by law to observe and report all traitorous conspiracies against Our crown, as aiding and abetting sedition will result in the swift and severe punishment any such threat to Our gracious rule demands. We command you to free your mind, unburden your spirit through the meditative emptiness of work. The Empire toils for you so that you may toil for the Empire.

THE EMPIRE IS OBEDIENT TO YOU BECAUSE YOU ARE OBEDIENT TO THE EMPIRE.

The Empire protects you because you protect the Empire.

I don't think a band like DT will be portraying the guys against sound as good guys. The NOMACS sound like jerks.

This Noble Proclamation of G.N.E.A. Given at Our Court at the Palatial Residence of New Maineland, Great Northern Empire of The Americas, in this, the twenty-seventh year of the reign of your Sovereign, Lord Nafaryus, Emperor and Head of the Realm, two hundredth fifty seven A.C., two thousandth two hundredth eighty-five, A.D.

2285 A.D. - 257 A.C. = 2028 A.D. Exactly one century after Overture 1928. Is the exact year of the modern portion of Scenes ever stated definitively? What is the event "C"? Is A.C. related to NOMACS?

Ravenskill Militia email:

TAKE HEED! People of the Great Northern Empire of the Americas, all of the Realm, as far as this message will be carried! I am Arhys, Son of Marhys, one of three remaining heirs to the displaced, forgotten, and forbidden Legion Of Sorrowful Song

Three heirs? Petrucci and Myung are founders of DT... the third is He Who Must Not Be Named.

I cannot find the names of their parents. It's not on Wiki, can't find it on Google, it's not even in my hardcover Lifting Shadows. I know the names of their wives/kids can be found, but has anyone every heard of their parents by name? "Maris" doesn't sound Korean, but I wonder what JP's mom's name is.

I contact you from the fair and just village of Ravenskill, far from the Emperor's Palace, in the outer edges of the Realm, nestled on Endless Isleland.

The Emperor is in New Maineland... is Ravenskill in California? Has the Big One struck, and LA is now Endless Isleland? If the evolution of language turns "island" into "isleland", then is it really "New Mainland" also?

By means almost indescribable, we have biohacked the receivers implanted into the flesh so many generations ago, jamming the cacophonous lull of the NOMACS for however much longer our primitive tech will abide.

We are a simple people, like most of you. Our hearts beat, our skin cracks, our bones grow tired, like all of you, even the nobility, even those who set themselves above us behind the tallest of walls and heaviest of armaments, as they are as empty as us.

OK, David and Goliath, got it.

BUT LO, of late, Ravenskill is energized by talk of a Chosen One, possessed of a forbidden sound, a stirring melody almost impossible to comprehend. You must've heard tale of this Chosen One, a humble servant with the innate ability to break the shackles of the mind and heart we must've forgotten how to perceive.

How can this be? Why is he the chosen one?

This Chosen One's very existence portends not the doom of which our Emperor warns, but rather, is a harbinger of untold possibilities. Could you dream of finding power beyond powerlessness? Could it be that very idea is a lie, sold to us by those who benefit most from our endless struggle?

My brothers and sisters across the Realm, I send this message to spread word that a Rebellion is rising in Ravenskill, to bring glad tidings that even as the Chosen One has been drafted by the fates, I have been drafted by the people to be your Commander. I am here to tell you that not only is this Chosen One real, and not a fiction as the Emperor’s messengers insist, but this Chosen One is, in fact, my blood, and my brother.

Let me introduce... MY BROTHER!

Seek the Songs for yourselves.

We all thought You Know Who took them when he split, but no! Dream Theater has got more nuggetz for us!

There is true freedom beyond what we’ve been taught. There is more than the endless drone of the NOMACS. I have seen and moreover, I have heard. I am but a messenger of the Chosen, a soldier of his light, a commander of rebellion. He, the Chosen One, is the conductor, of a force once thought lost, a force unrivaled by swords, steel, or even fire, wind, and water. TAKE HEED and PREPARE!

Calling it now: John the Baptrucci and the Chosen Myung. They are ready to throw down. Prepare for another Myung Tackle live!

 

[Black Wizard]

Holy crap. The London show is expensive.

 

[SinisterMinisterX]

I suspect the entire DT tour will be more expensive than usual.

We now have some unofficial confirmation that The Astonishing is a rock opera. http://www.triffidanddanger.se/dream-theater-ger-intim-konsert-i-stockholm/ - translate that page to English.

Rumors are that the show will be out of the ordinary. The big rumor is major scenery changes on the scale of The Wall tour, where Floyd built and tore down a wall onstage through the show. I suspect that DT is going for the full opera treatment: this tour will be for seated audiences in opera halls or other such theaters, and nothing but the new album will be played. Tickets will be priced accordingly (read: $$$$$$).