martindavey87 Damn, is this a tough listening experience or what?!

Now, I love Dream Theater, and of course I enjoyed their Liquid Tension Experiment side-project, so it'd make sense that when this album was released, marketed as "Liquid Trio Experiment" due to the absence of guitarist John Petrucci, it was something I had to have in my collection.

And there it shall remain until my dying days, though sadly not by choice, but more due to my obsessive collecting disorder (is this a real thing?).

'Spontaneous Combustion' is nothing more than improvised jazz fusion jams and rehearsals. It's so musically self-indulgent I struggle to see what made them think it was something worth releasing that people would want to hear. I struggle even more to comprehend the fact that there is probably someone out there that genuinely listens to this and enjoys it.

But nope. Not me.

I can appreciate the amazing chemistry and versatility of all the musicians involved, and while there's maybe a few cool "moments" dotted around, it's not something I'll ever come back to or make an effort to find among the midst of mindless self-indulgence. As a whole, the album is just boring, and features nothing of any real substance.

Plus, it irks me that these guys can release and sell an album featuring nothing more than a staggering 78 minutes of mindless noodling, and it's still better than anything I could come up with.

Sometimes it sucks being a collector.