ON THE BACKS OF ANGELS

Its nice to have a Dream Theater album that doesn't open up with Dark and Cheesy thunder clouds and cheesy "Metal" melodies with crappy "metal" puns like a nightmare to remember. That's refreshing at the least. It is absolutely phenomenal not hear Portnoy's terrible, unnecessary and UNWANTED VOICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. Thank you god. Also, the lyrics are finally not obnoxiously corny.

Now the bad:

Right out of the gate, I know a lot of people are going to claim they love this song and praise it with-out really thinking about it too much and I can understand that. DT has starved their fans of quality music for over 10 years now. And one must remember, even crumbs seem like a feast to a starving man, so people are ready to like this stuff, and so am I, but I have to listen to it objectively.

Seriously, the song is ok, but it just kind of meanders. This is supposed to be the opener to a huge album and it doesn't really grab my attention. Its feels like it should be a later track on the album. Its takes a while to get going and just feels unfocused. The arrangement just wanders around without any specific build up or progression and then abruptly ends. Take a song like Metropolis which builds and builds and works on a logical progression which feels like a roller coaster ride, where as this song just feels like cross country skiing. Sure, The scenery is nice but its not exciting. This song has nothing on Images and Words or When Dream and Day Unite. I want something that will really blow me away and make me say "wow, how are they doing that?" Oh well, I move on as cautiously optimistic.

Also the album artwork is god awfully bland and boring and uninspired. I'm praying that this is just for the Single, but I'm getting worried. Hopefully that other artwork which leaked is the official one. Just google Dream Theater A Dramatic Turn of Events and you can see it. That one is much better.

So overall, it looks like we have finally moved out of the Terrible category that Dream Theater has been in for the past 5 years and quickly moving through the tolerable category and are flirting with the "just good" region. I seriously HATED Dream Theater for a while there, so this is like a miracle. Who knows, DT might just make it back into the "great" category once again, but its too soon to make that judgement. They will probably never create another Images and Words, but who knows what the future holds.

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