85 is a baroque atmospheric piece that helps establish the atmosphere, but in context of the album at hand, it wasn't as necessary as something like the Hellion where it was far more effective. It's not as much of a waste as Ides of March but Tyrant could have easily opened the album. The fact that Prelude did not appear on some pressings says it all really.
86 has some great drumming to begin proceedings before kicking off with a solid metal riff which helps with the rampant and urgent atmosphere that it aims to create. I haven't listened to the Follow The Blind album, so context wise I'm unsure how it fits in, but it's a hectic track, and seemingly transitions into the final part of the album, a similar task Losfer Words did on Powerslave. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on this Blind Guardian fans. The ending is a bit too abrupt for me however.
87 has an escalating presence to it, which represents its source material quite well (erotomania being perceived as a delusional feeling), perhaps someone slipping deep and deeper into delusion as the musical tone becomes more and more refined, which is oxymoronic, but also a good representation of the sufferer's point of view, whilst also represent the turmoil in his life too. That's my interpretation of the song, and it represents its ethos extremely well, as well as just being a generally good song.
88 is a fun song and sounds good from an instrumental point of view, but other than that, there's little substance to it and just seems like a throw-away song. The yodelling comes to a point of being cringe-worthy at points also and is pretty annoying also.
85 and 86 are both OK instrumentals, but 86 serves a much larger purpose than 85 in the scheme of things and is generally a more worthwhile song.
88 is very much a mixed bag, but a mixed bag won't serve well against a very solid and all-around good Dream Theater instrumental.
86 and 87.
EDIT: Fuck, voted 88 by mistake. Could you count my vote for 87 instead?
