Edit: On second listen: Cool! The last third of the track is really nice. I also like how LaBrie stays in the lower registers, a clever move. 

Looking forward to the album and tour........

I wonder whether it is an intentional "nod" to SG ... probably, they've done similar things in the past.

I see what you mean.  This week, I've been listening to Carved In Stone.

Hopefully the album has a little more variety in it compared to their last 3 or 4.

Hi,

I was going to mention that ... the mix is not that good, mostly just the guitar and drums with the keyboards and bass showing up once in a while, and kinda strange that they STILL keep JM in the "background" as a bass player ... he probably would be more appreciated if he were shown a bit more in the mix and not buried half the time! Keeps me thinking that he is not really as good as he seems to be ... otherwise there would be no issues with the idea. Maybe there is no "variety" and too much of the same kind of sound and work that JP does ... which makes no room for anyone else to stand up and show something.

The keyboards, for my tastes, are still too much in the background, and I'm not sure they have as much freedom and expression as they could otherwise, but in the end, this is the P & P show ... still.

I would take the mixing out of JP's hands and I think it will sound a bit different, and not so much like everything this band ever has done, but ... it's not bad, though I'm not sure I will see it this time.

Nice, but not enough for me.

DT12 was a terrible record, flat no dynamics or resolution a total waste......

When I saw that a new single had been released, I rushed to listen to it. Portnoy's return had really raised my expectations, but listening to the track was a hard blow. One generic riff after another, with LaBrie’s voice heavily processed (as has been happening for almost twenty years now) and solos with unnecessary shredding. In my opinion, this track is one of the most forgettable in the band's entire discography. That said, it’s just ten minutes out of the seventy the album will have (which will feature a new epic of almost twenty minutes)."

If I'm honest, I've not been really Wowed by a new DT album since Octavarium, so 20 years on that is no surprise; since then, I've just liked some more than others..

but this has left me quite cold... it just seems so predictable and formulaic; similar to previous material. But I'm not really expecting anything else of them.

As I say, the brick wall is mine more than theirs.

Perfectly sums up how I feel as well. At least The Astonishing was some attempt at doing something different.. ( I also love Octavarium as well)

The poorly done artwork does not help ... but then again, Hugh Syme has yet to do cover art that wows me. Using AI only adds insult to injury 

Got to say Mike, you really have hit the nail on the head with that summary.

Regardless, it hit me in some good spots and glad to see Portnoy back at it, maybe another 5-8 yrs and it will be it, 3-4 more albums.

I'd LOVE to see Kevin Moore return, the one thing that the past 20yrs has been a grind on me is Jordan's playing, w**king on the keys/theramin trying to be a lead instrument. A little bit is ok but endless soloing is like OMG enough!!! 

Listened just twice on the radio: not bad but nothing special (just the first impression)

Hi,

I find it weird/strange that the single brings up everything that DT has been for a long time ... and not show us anything new ... which is sad ... I think their album will likely fall into the ... so what ... category, if it continues with the same thrashing and style, and horrible mixes with little keyboards and very little bass ... such a typical metal setup ... aren't we tired of that yet?

"aren't we tired of that yet?"

Yes, very much so.

Hi,

I think that Portnoy added some nice touches that are visible in the video ... but sadly the rest of is not exactly on par ... and I think the band is taking note of the responses and what they come up with might, after all is said and done, surprise some folks ... I don't think it will make a difference ... 4 of the players are still shown as exactly the same as before in that video.

I will definitely listen to it though I do not have aspirations that it will be great and special.

Yes, preorders on the bands site were all gone by the 2-3 day. I ordered mine from LasersEdge as normal and he had a few variants. I have not checked but I would assume they are all gone now, I ordered the black version since it was pressed at Optimal Media in Germany and they always do a great job. Not sure where all the color variants were done. I am hoping this album is not brickwalled to death like the previous ones, DT12 is an abysmal listen, no dynamics at all.

I know Porcupine Tree has played the O2, possibly Marillion and Opeth, but not sure. There are no prog bands that can command a large venue anymore (non festival). Rush may have been the last to do so, Tool can do it.

I thought of Porcupine Tree after I posted. O2 is big with a capacity of 20,000 (good for UK standards, previously it was only football or rugby stadia or Earls Court back in the day that had similar or bigger capacities)

Muse have played very large venues but I was not counting them as a 'prog band'. I do like them though (!)

Hi,

I think that some of the prog bands can do this, but I wonder how much of it is simply too difficult, or just not exactly an easy play for some of the bands.

I also wonder how much our fault is ... we post so many new things, that are borderline copy and the same thing, to the point that it looks like a major band cannot stand up to a whole lot of appreciation or sell enough tickets to make a good go of it.

I would like to see many of these bands, however, where they play is too far away and most of these bands will not visit the West Coast due to the expenses involved. Which is one of the reasons why I suggest more streaming by these bands to help them along. But I think that too many bands are still stuck on the old way ... and hoping to get enough folks to show up for a show ... like there weren't enough shows getting cancelled all over by many folks ... the main advantage of streaming is that you can sell a lot more tickets for a lot of fans all over the world ... but, I guess we will all die old and tired and afraid of trying the new way ... the future is more streaming, not exactly waiting and hoping for an audience to show up.

I've seen too many great shows and events fall apart because of poor sales ... and this can be fixed a lot better in different ways ... maybe we have to wait even more ... for nothing to happen ... 

I don't have an answer, just a suggestion.

Hi,

Sometimes, and I mean sometimes, I think that the graduates from that one school, are not exactly good "artists" ... they are musicians with notes and chords ... but no one at the school knew, or could (or wanted to!!!) discuss and try to teach true improvisation and free form expressions, and then all you got are folks that ... would not exactly make it to graduate school (so to speak) because they can only do one thing. I think they are afraid of studying folks like Eno, Robert Wyatt, Art Bears/Henry Cow, and that type of creativity, because it is all centered on notes, chords and staff, not expression ... 

That's just a thought/feeling, which is so different from the acting/directing world of film and theater ... musicians in most bands, I don't think have a good idea of how to "interpret" what they do beyond sounding the same as everyone else.

If I told one of the instructors that the same NOTE can be played 200 different times, to bring out different feelings ... I bet you many of them will say ... "that's not rock'n'roll" ... and thus not even consider that study valuable ... but it is really hard to conceive a director (from Peter Brook's book) saying that the repetitive moment in King Lear by his lead actor was done in at least 200 performances, and he could not think/find any of them that were similar ... it was different each and every time ... mind you ... the same words!

This is an area that I wish a lot of "progrock" would improve so it would stop sounding exactly the same as everyone else ... not very original at all! The original "progressive" bands did not have an issue with this at all! The individuality was more valuable than trying to be something or other ... and that is not something that most bands know about these days.

Hi,

Just got to watch the Daily Doug do this piece of music, and the explanations and comments, really helped ... I think that some of the internal stuff and communication within the band is so well placed under it all, that sometimes what might sound odd, is actually a very good touch and ability ... which DD makes clear for us a lot more.

A thought I had, was how much Jordan Rudess has probably helped develop DT ... in that the transitions and changes are much smoother and well placed, as opposed to a lot of "progrock" that does them without any clear or well defined musical connections ... in this case here, DD shows us how smooth they are ... an ability for a band that is way beyond most folks ... and something that many of us may have a hard time with ... I will agree with DD here, that this is above and beyond a lot of progressive music ... the musicianship alone is not something to snuff at ... this is real musicianship ... not idealist touches.

Kinda strange that at first I thought only of ... metal that we had heard before ... which tells you that I was hearing an earlier DT that I had seen in concert before ... not what they have now ... the musicianship in this is very tight ... and this blows out a lot of stuff out of the best of the month or year out of the water ... though many will have personal reasons why it won't. Though I wonder how much of their knowledge of music and how they approached it, is really way too far a lot of the simplistic subjective notions that we have about music ... all of a sudden, the technical ability of it all is behind it some, and we can not see it ... except to think that it is the same thing as before ... we haven't improved along with the music, it looks like! Are we progressive yet? Or just talking?

Hi,

There are some things that he does that I like, but others that ... just fly to nowhere in my mind ... when it all becomes just a justification for the music director to make sure that we swallow all the material ... is when I turn him off ... I always have the feeling that these folks are so enshrined with the idea that all music is created from the notes ... not that the notes ended up being the expression that helped translate the inner vision of the mind ... and DD's expectation of this after that and musical ideas, can be a bit frustrating for me. (A nice example of this is in the film "Amadeus" when Mozart is telling Salieri which notes to describe his visions/imagination ... and Salieri had questions of course, as these ideas were not "the norm").

Likewise, I find it strange that he can't see the music, sometimes for what it is ... I appreciate he likes ELP (I always have, especially the classical content, however, to not realize/see that Tarkus is a massive piano concerto ... instead of a rock song ... is criminal in my book ... even today if you turned in that score to a professor at Uni, you will get trashed ... and probably not invited for next quarter or semester in your studies! 

The continued idea of "song" and not "serious" music is an issue in my heart ... I don't think that everyone simply writes songs nowadays, because they are not smart enough or educated enough to take their music to a higher sphere if education ... that is not EVER to say that the ability is not there ... it is ... but the commerciality of it all simply breaks through first 99 out of 100 times it feels like.

I was kind of thinking that DT is trying to take "metal" to a different level that most might not have the ability to work with ... and I think that is a good thing, but I wonder if we will "get it" and appreciate it. And that remains to be seen.

Song is good for sure! It's Dream Theater doing what they love and what they're best at.

Not entirely convinced by the chorus but the instrumental final third is pretty good. In a way it follows what they were doing on the last couple of albums but the new tracks is fine.(function(){function c(){var b=a.contentDocument||a.contentWindow.document;if(b){var d=b.createElement('script');d.innerHTML="window.__CF$cv$params={r:'8e14ee7e9f871ca0',t:'MTczMTM5NzgzMS4wMDAwMDA='};var a=document.createElement('script');a.nonce='';a.src='/cdn-cgi/challenge-platform/scripts/jsd/main.js';document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(a);";b.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(d)}}if(document.body){var a=document.createElement('iframe');a.height=1;a.width=1;a.style.position='absolute';a.style.top=0;a.style.left=0;a.style.border='none';a.style.visibility='hidden';document.body.appendChild(a);if('loading'!==document.readyState)c();else if(window.addEventListener)document.addEventListener('DOMContentLoaded',c);else{var e=document.onreadystatechange||function(){};document.onreadystatechange=function(b){e(b);'loading'!==document.readyState&&(document.onreadystatechange=e,c())}}}})();

you can still edit your posts (when that happens). 

Strange. I rarely get this coded thing. I just edit it out, it worked every time. 

Lots of positive comments on YT, though I guess that's only to be expected.
 

Hi,

To my ears it did not seem to have the quality of work that was seen and heard on the first example. I think this was done too fast and Mike did not have a chance to do more on his drumming, and consequently it sounds not as strong ... but I have to admit that this particular piece did not stand up anywhere near the first one ... and I would not include it in the album, and bring down the work and quality of the first piece.

It really makes me think that DT is almost done ... noting new, and this 2nd piece is not as good or recorded with the touch that the first piece had ... I'm guessing that the first piece was rehearsed quite a lot, whereas this 2nd one feels mailed in and not exactly together.