OCTAVARIUM

It's obvious that Mike and John listened to a lot of Muse and Pink Floyd before recording this. If DT would focus on DT music and not be involved in a gazillion side- projects this disc may have had potential.

"The Root of all Evil" opens with some good heavy guitar riffs, similar to something on "Train of Thought". Fair tune but nothing new.

"The Answer Lies Within", is horrid! I enjoy several ballads by this band but this is criminal. Boring, childish, and the lyrics are pathetic.

"These Walls" sounds familiar... not that there is anything wrong with that, but they've done it better before.

"I Walk Beside You" is plagued with a very lackluster commercial sounding chorus.

"Panic Attack" is a heavy shred-fest. great tune.

"Never Enough" a blatant Muse rip-off is decent, after the plagiarism... but again the chorus seems very weak.

"Sacrificed Sons" gets off to a slow start but it's another great tune.

The epic 24-minute "Octavarium" Pink Floyd/Yes/Crimson intro lasts far too long. Why copy these bands? Finally, at 12:17 the tempo of the tune picks up just in time to salvage the song, for a bit. Time changes, great musicianship, and quite a bit of shredding occur which is DT's trademark. So why isn't there more of this? At 19:53 we hear another keyboard riff that plummets this tune back into ballad land, so unfortunately we are rewarded with only approximately seven minutes of what DT does best.

It's seems that DT is running out of ideas. The potential this band has is immense and to squander that talent and write below average music like this is embarrassing.