DREAM THEATER — Dream Theater (review)

DREAM THEATER — Dream Theater album cover

Album · 2013 · Progressive Metal

4/5 · 2013-10-06
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Dream Theater (2013) is the self-titled twelfth full-length album release by US progressive metal genre leaders Dream Theater. It's the second album released without co-founding drummer Mike Portnoy after A Dramatic Turn of Events (2011). Unlike that album, new drummer Mike Mangini has this time been involved in the writing of the album, although it remains a mostly John Petrucci penned release, having written all lyrics except for those to Surrender to Reason (which were written by bassist John Myung) and having credits for writing the music on every single track along with keyboardist Jordan Rudess.

Quite why Dream Theater have chosen their twelfth album of all things to be self-titled is unknown to me, although I can think of a couple of possibilities. It could perhaps be because by this stage in their career, even with Portnoy's surprise exit, people know where they're at with Dream Theater. This is a band that you know are going to deliver high quality progressive metal, but without breaking their own mould, at least not in any significant way. In this sense they are victims of their own success. I love Dream Theater's music and the prior A Dramatic Turn of Events ended up being one of my favourite albums by the group, but I haven't been able to get really excited for the last few Dream Theater releases the way I can other bands work, because there's never any doubt in my mind what the album is going to more or less sound like, and Dream Theater proves to be no exception.

It could also be though because the songs on Dream Theater seem to represent every aspect of the band that they've presented to date. You have your heavy and intense sounds of the latter days as per albums like Train of Thought (2003) in the form of a track like lead single The Enemy inside (which let's just take a moment to point out is the best single Dream Theater have put out to promote an album in ages), instrumental work in Enigma Machine, an epic of over twenty minutes in length in Illumination Theory, as well as songs which feel more like old school Dream Theater like The Looking Glass, and a balladry type in Along for the Ride. There are some newer developments to be heard of course. A decent portion of the album can be consider as symphonic progressive metal, something that really began to show on A Dramatic Turn of Events while some of the guitar riffs have a bit of power metal technique to them. Whether the latter is the result of new influence from Mangini or simply an unintentional fluke is beyond my ability to say, but all the same it was quite nice to hear it flavouring Dream Theater’s otherwise technical proggy sound on a couple of tracks.

Or it could be a bit of both. Or neither. It's all just speculation on my part and either is a valid reason for a self-titled release after being around twenty-eight years in my view. Let’s just hope that whatever the band’s reason for the title it’s not that they consider this the definitive Dream Theater release, because quite honestly it’s far from it. Although it would be unfair to say it brings the band’s run of high quality albums, which began with fan favourite Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory (1999), to an end, Dream Theater is a step down from the last couple of offerings from the group, especially the prior A Dramatic Turn of Events. It’s a solid album, the sort of work that an established and skilled group like Dream Theater should be putting out, but it only really achieves the bare minimum of what I expect of them.

There are a few ups and downs to be found during the release when talking song quality. It starts of excellent with a short instrumental, False Awakening Suite (bet that everyone, like me, thought this would be one of their epic length tracks when the titles were first released) which surges into the riff driven The Enemy Inside. The quality stays high until The Bigger Picture, which comes over as being filler in comparison to the album's previous offerings. This song marks the turning point for the album; everything prior is either exceptional or top tier work but at this point the album has got as good as it’s ever going to get. While further songs like Behind the Veil and the album’s epic closer Illumination Theory go on to assert themselves as album highlights nothing to able to compare to the sort of energy heard in the early stages of the release. Illumination Theory does of course showcase how to do an epic twenty plus minute track right but at the same time falls short of the greatness of past classics. All songs are great based on their own merits but I can’t shake the feeling that Dream Theater is one case where the whole isn’t greater than the sum of its parts, but the opposite. It’s also been the opposite of an album that could be called a grower, as I’ve been left with lesser impressions with every listen I’ve given the album.

Dream Theater may be a step down for the legendary band but ultimately I can’t say it disappointed me. It has several betters in the band’s catalogue such as the albums I’ve mentioned previously in this review but also Black Clouds & Silver Linings (2009) and Octavarium (2005) deserve mentions, not to of course forget breakthrough release Images & Words (1992). But it also stands superior to several of their releases including Falling into Infinity (1997), Systematic Chaos (2007) and Awake (1994), making Dream Theater something of a mid-range album for the band. A great album tier rating is deserved.

84/100

(Originally written for Heavy Metal Haven: http://metaltube.freeforums.org/dream-theater-dream-theater-t3192.html)