QUEEN VS DREAM THEATER

Manunkind wrote: Certif1ed wrote: Silly poll - apples vs aardvarks, but no contest; Queen have it completely sewn up - they're one of the best bands in the archives (at their best, that is...). As for "pop rock", that statement clearly comes from someone who has never heard Queen II. And this is the point - Queen have one excellent album, whereas DT have at least four.

I don't think that's true - Queen have 4 excellent albums, some good albums and a couple of naff albums, while DT have only naff albums.

Dream Theater has some of the greatest compositional skills of any band. As evidence of their great compositional creativity let's take a song like Metropolis Part I, the arpeggitated section ending the insturmental section is sheer genius, not only is the arpeggio cycle brilliant writing, it shows amazing technique while the insturmentalists stay away from open strings.

Anyone can write a cycle of arpeggios - you're talking pure technique here, as you underlined in that last sentence - not skill in composition. Skill in composition is not about playing technique. At all. I reviewed "Images and Words", and "Metropolis Part 1" impresses me not one iota, as far as composition goes - it's decidedly below average IMHO.

More evidence would be Learning to Live where Petrucci does so many different layers of guitar harmonies giving the song the most grandiose of a feel. 

Brian May was doing guitar layers (and more of them - also backwards) looong before Petrucci. Petrucci sticks with very safe harmonies and precise "following" movement - he clearly hasn't got a clue about counterpoint or any real compositional technique.

What about the Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence epic?  The 42 minute masterpiece is amazing from the first note of Overture to the final chord of Losing time. 

Not in my opinion it isn't - I think it's awful.

Petrucci's solo in Goodnight Kiss shows incredible feel for his guitar.

Not to me it doesn't - it sounds calculated, clinical and decidedly unfeeling.

Soliatry Shell has bright atmosphere and sets up About To Crash (Reprise) perfectly.

Define "perfectly" - it sounds perfectly dreadful to me.

What about Scenes From a Memory, Overture 1928, Dance Of Eternity-One Last Time, and Finally Free are nothing less than brilliiant composition. 

Not in my opinion, and I'd bet that if I analysed the composition I'd find very simple structures and probably stolen riffs.

I hope you didn't say that Freddie Mercury has more musical education than the piano phoenomenon that attended Juliard at the age of nine. 

Where did I say that? What difference does it make to Rock music anyway?

Jordan Rudess would fit perfectly on keys for almost any band.

I doubt it very much!

You don't like Rudess's synths? 

No - the sounds he chooses suck worse than a sucking thing in Suck Street, Sucksville.

I think Rudess has done an excellent job straying from the typical analog synth sounds.  Rudess uses synths that sound closer to insturments than the simple analog fuzz. 

They sound like a digitized nightmare to me. Give me authentic analogue every time.

Rudess's Kurzweil also has the most authentic orchestral synths i have ever heard. 

You're joking, right? I spotted them straight away!

 I was shocked when i couldn't find orchestra credits anywhere in the Six Degres Of Inner Turbulence album.

I wasn't.

And none of this answers any of my questions, or helps the debate one iota, except to prove that you have a lot of opinions.

Which is fair enough - but try not to present them as some kind of fact, unless you have actual evidence to back it all up, OK?

Not everyone can write a cycle of arpeggios, in fact most bands do not write cycles of arpeggios. 

It's not hard, and Deep Purple did it. Among many others. Yngwie Malmsteen, for example. Not everyone does it because ultimately it's boring.

Metropolis is special because it isn't just some guitar virtuoso showing off how fast he can play a E minor arpeggio.  Metropolis is special because the arpeggios are constantly modulating in a Bach fashion that it is impossible to write any key signature for this part.

No - it's not impossible. One thing I've really noticed about Dream Theater is that they stick to safe tonalities, simply using modal scales and arpeggios to try to hide this fact.

And modulating in a Bach fashion is not only not impossible, but part of every Secondary school music pupil's basic education - you have to learn how to harmonise and modulate in the style of J. S. Bach before you can learn more advanced techniques.

I once wrote a computer program (back in 1991) that automatically harmonises melodies in the style of Bach, recalculating for modulations as necessary .

On top of that, playing those arpeggios in a signature other than 4/4 is an excellent composition technique.  Adding an extra beat to a phrase in a signature like 5/4 instead of 4/4 or 7/8 instead of 6/8 makes a band a more enjoyable listen.

To you, maybe. It's all academic - and merely a technique that's based in mathematics, not composition.

I don't find it's a more enjoyable listen because of polyrhythms - music is greater than the sum of its parts.

I see no flaws in Petrucci's counterpoint.

You know, I didn't think you would somehow...

  Now maybe Petrucci isn't an 18th Century Couterpoint musical genius, but most of his guitar composition surpasses 19th Century Counterpoint which is really quite simple.

Oh yes?

Care to give an example of so-called "simple" C19 counterpoint and where Petrucci surpasses it?

You haven't answered any of my other techical questions so far, so it's a safe bet that you can't.

On Goodnight Kiss, you just debated that Petrucci has not a clue about counterpoint, but now your saying that the solo is entirely calculated.  Dream Theater is a band that must be perfect on studio recordings, or else the band could not survive.  I wouldn't doubt for a second that the solo is calculated notation wise, but it has the flow of an improvised solo.  Especially the rythmn where Petrucci is really feeding off of the drums.

Calculated does not mean skillful counterpoint, so that point is moot.

Being "perfect" on studio recordings is meaningless unless the music is good too - you're still talking about execution, not composition.

You think a particular solo (you don't say which) has the flow of an improvised solo - I'd like to hear that particular solo, as that is one feature that is distinctly missing from most of Petrucci's soloing - it all sounds pre-calculated so that all notes fit the harmony mathematically - almost as if a computer had worked out where the notes should be and where the columns of vertical harmony should slot in like pre-fabricated blocks.

Solitary Shell is a perfect prelude to About To Crash (Reprise), because it is a constant build in tonality.

How? You make these statements as if they're fact, but do not have any evidence to back them up! I do not hear this "constant build in tonality" (whatever that is) of which you speak. Please elaborate, as I don't understand what you mean.

  The song starts off quite soft and "poco a poco" crescendos to the climax that About To Crash (Reprise) is.  Then About To Crash (Reprise) falls slightly and then crescendos to the true climax of the piece, Losing Time.

So it gets louder and quieter? Am I missing something?

As for Scenes From a Memory, the structure of the songs (especially the ones i mentioned earlier) is nothing short of excellent.  Overture 1928 constains great trades off melody between all the insturmentalist, a technique perfect by Brittish compoers like Gustav Holst. 

What does this mean? "trades off melody"?

I hear nothing that puts me in mind of Holst.

Holst's approach was strongest in harmonic textures - none of which I hear in Dream Theater, who always seem to choose the safe option rather than get experimental with harmonic textures.

Dance Of Eternity is technical brilliance and saying something like technical skill is not part of composing is a slam to brilliant composers like John Cage.

How so? Please bring some facts to your statements - this is meaningless drivel otherwise.

John Cage did not sweep pick arpeggios and scales to the best of my knowledge - indeed, a lot of Cage's approach was in philosophy.

As for the structure of the song, the cycle of time signature is very impresive and few parts are repeated.  The creativity of Jordan Rudess rag time interlude is something that i never saw coming.

It sounds awful to me - that's one part I particularly dislike, as it has no grounding in actual ragtime - it's more like a lazy impression of what it might sound like.

As for "cycles of time signatures", it's meaningless unless the music is somehow inproved by it.

One Last Time is incredibly simple compared to it's scene partner Dance Of Eternity, but i find it to be a great way to end the scene.  Finally Free, i mean come on.  Hating this song is just bigotry, it goes through so many tones and emotions.  There is something in this song that anyone can appreciate.

Hmm. Have to agree to disagree there - you cannot make such broad statements as if they're truth, as no two people appreciate music in the same way, as you seem to think.

With regards to Mercury and Rudess on the piano you slammed Rudess's sound and supported Mercury's piano spots as dramtic, humorous, and musically educated.  I say that Mercury's musical education does not hold a candlestick to Rudess's.  In support of Rudess, i use evidence of his studying at Julliard and his career being one of length and versitility first playing in a band like the Dixie Dregs and then later joining Dream Theater.  Rudess is a first class musician.

You miss the point entirely. Mercury's style shows education - but not necessarily musical education! It's absolutely clear where the music is grounded, and it's also clear that Mercury was hyper-inventive and of the type of person that played with music - improvised and created rather than painstakingly calculated the life out of.

Academic musical education has very little to do with rock music - in fact, it's probably better in most cases that rock musicians do not have too much of it or they go thinking they're something special - which shows in the music, which ends up sounding, well... academic.

It's ridiculous to slam Rudess's choice of synth sounds in a battle of creativity.  I say Rudess is creative because he uses most unconventional synth sounds and you defeat them because of tastes.  Maybe you don't like Rudess's sounds, ok that's fair, but that does not reduce his skill or creativity. 

Not really - timbre is one fifth of what makes music.

If I don't like Rudess' sounds, then that lessens his skill to my ears, by one fifth.

All music boils down to taste eventually - which is what you seem to be forgettting. You're presenting everything as if it's some kind of fact, which is why I'm picking up on it and wondering where your statements come from.

If it was just your opinion, I couldn't argue with it, could I?

Maybe Rudess's synth sounds in Losing Time, but Overture has brilliant authentic orchestral sounds.  Many keyboardists lust over the technology Kurzweil has in their synths.

Rudess invented those sounds, did he?

All in all, very unconvincing - but please don't stop trying to convince me - unless you think that somehow I'm being unfair or worse, plain ignorant. Arrogant and patronising I can live with

Queen did some good stuff, but their music is not as original as everyone puts it up to be.  Queen was different for their time.  They didn't sound like the typical hard rock band from late '70s.  They sounded more influence by '40s jazz. 

We're yet to talk about insturmental might of either of these bands, and i think the reason why is that Dream Theater is a CLEAR victor there.  John Myung has talent that is so far beyond John Deacon, Rudess is a full time keyboardist as opposed to the spoofs Mercury did on piano, but i will say Petrucci and May would be a good comparison in creativity  and skill.  Insturmentally, Dream Theater rapes Queen.

Composition is based off of music theory, which is highly mathematical.  If someone were to know all the ins and outs of composing wouldn't they be making mathematically correct music. 

Music theory has a high degree of mathematics to it, that's true - but not even the great mathematician Bach used pure mathematics to compute his works. Making mathematically correct music takes all of the art out of it - sterilises it.

Composing music is about understanding the rules and breaking or bending them as only a human being can.

Using mathematics and computers is another way to produce music, but it'll never beat humans for pure creativity and invention.

Humans can create music without a great knowledge of mathematics - thus proving it's only a single element.

19th Century Counterpoint is much easier than 18th Century Counterpoint, the only true rule of 19th Century Counterpoint is the abscence of parallel 5ths, so therefore it would be quite easy for a musician like Petrucci to surpass C19.  I will say Petrucci is absent to C18 a much more difficult composition.

Again, that's a very broad and sweeping statement that is in no way connected with reality! The absence of parallel 5ths is NOT the only true rule of C19 counterpoint - where the heck did you learn that? Whoever told you that should be sacked.

Parallel 5th avoidance is a basis of composing in the style of J.S. Bach, who composed in the 17th century.

19th Century counterpoint is NOT easier than earlier counterpoint. On the contrary, Composers in the 19th Century applied counterpoint rules from previous eras and worked on their own methodologies, extending the rules to suit the new styles of Romanticism.

Execution and composition should work hand in hand.  I keep bringing up execution mainly because that is what makes Dream Theater a special listen.  It relates to composition becuase they have to compose before they play don't they? 

No - exectution is what comes after composition. I fully acknowledge that Dream Theater are all about execution. It's the compositions that I take issue with.

By "trades off melody" i mean that the insturmentalist are in a state of flux of who's playing the melody.  Holst first movement of his first military suite in Eb uses the chaconne melody with different insturments throughout the entire tune.  I see this influence in Overture 1928.

Passing a melody from part to part is no big deal - Deep Purple did it and so did Queen.

With Mercury being someone that just improvised and such, is it safe to say that Queen lacks the execution of Dream Theater? 

No. Queen executed their music differently to Dream Theater.

Maybe Queen is on a slightly higher level of creativity than Dream Theater, but does creativity equate musicianship?

It's a VERY large part of being in band that writes its own material, yes. If you're not creative, why bother, unless you just want to be a tribute band or in a symphony orchestra.

I think it's fair to say that Dream Theater has a higher level of execution than Queen, so should this arguement shift to what is more musical execution or creativity?

You decide - the argument started with your original post, which ran

AtLossForWords wrote: Queen did some good stuff, but their music is not as original as everyone puts it up to be.  Queen was different for their time.  They didn't sound like the typical hard rock band from late '70s.  They sounded more influence by '40s jazz.  We're yet to talk about insturmental might of either of these bands, and i think the reason why is that Dream Theater is a CLEAR victor there.  John Myung has talent that is so far beyond John Deacon, Rudess is a full time keyboardist as opposed to the spoofs Mercury did on piano, but i will say Petrucci and May would be a good comparison in creativity  and skill.  Insturmentally, Dream Theater rapes Queen.