A CHANGE OF SEASONS

This so-called "EP" (rather due to the form but to the length, as it contains nearly an hour of music) is a difficult effort to rate. To me, at least, it is inevitable to compare it to Pink Floyd's ''Meddle'' and ELP's ''Tarkus'', which are commonly accepted as ''one great song and the rest just filler''-albums. When looking at the format, one notices that the CD contains one long epic, the title track, and multiple covers of classic rock songs. This aforementioned title track had gone through years of composition and reworking, and this is clearly notable while listening. The composition is clearly one of the most well planned songs in the band's history, the segments flow from one into another, being related to each other by motives. This way, ''A Change of Seasons'' is a projecting end of the band's classic era, mainly consisting of ''Images & Words'' and the respected but controversial ''Awake''. If being released as a 'single', this would have made a five-star EP.

The encore to this epic would have made an average cover-ep if released without the title track. While this is a musical honour to the greats of classic rock music combined with the typical Dream Theater profiling, the balance sometimes gets lost within the songs or combinations of songs. There are two ways to cover a song: first is to play the song as closely as possible to the original. The other is to merge the material with the band's own style. With a selection ranging from Elton John to Deep Purple and Kansas, Dream Theater cover both types of covering, totally dependent on the song. They do a good jobs with 'Perfect Strangers' and segments of 'The Big Medley' and 'Led Zeppelin Medley', yet it is difficult to judge the two Elton John songs. I, up to now, am not sure about the way I like John's songs played in Dream Theater style. On the whole, they do a good job honouring the greats of rock. This honour, however, is by no means essential to those already familiar with the material, but a good opportunity for modern day Dream Theater fans to get in touch with the legends of 70's and 80's rock, presented by a leading (though controversially discussed) group of the modern prog rock scene.

Rating this EP is, as stated before, very difficult. With about 24 minutes of essential 5-star material and the other 34 filled by a 3-star tribute performance, I have decided to give the average rating of rounded 4 stars. And, after all, this record fully lives up to the expectations given for it being a four-star: it really is an excellent addition to your prog music collection, trust me!