Octavarium

I first started listening to Dream Theater in the summer of 2005, when I heard three of their songs (The Glass Prison, This Dying Soul, and a clip of Panic Attack) on the Gigantour website. I immediately picked up Images & Words, and shortly thereafter Octavarium. I was nothing short of amazed by the both of them.

The album opens with an eerie intro to The Root Of All Evil, which musically picks up where In The Name Of God left off with the opening piano note and lyrically pisck up where This Dying Soul left off, since Root is steps 6 and 7 in the Alcholic Recovery Twelve Step Program. It quickly turns into one of the BEST headbanging, hard-rocking songs I have ever heard, with a killer verse riff and a musical reference to This Dying Soul in the middle as well. After eight-odd minutes of this prog-metal bliss it opens into the second track, the soft The Answer Lies Within. A great track about finding out who you really are and what to do with your life, it features some great vocals by James and leaves you feeling content. Then the powerful, heavy, almost ballad-like metal of These Walls, a track which the English language cannot do justice. A beautiful song with some great musicianship and melody by Petrucci, Myung, Portnoy, and Rudess, it has a great power to inspire emotion, and it has quickly become one of my favorite DT songs. Then the album's only low point, the almost cliched I Walk Beside You. The only song I don't care for on the album, it sounds like a bad U2 cover, and not very DT-like at all. But the album picks up again with the searing Panic Attack. A great bass intro leads into a crunching guitar riff and some great skinpounding from Portnoy, with lyrics a bit easier to decipher than most of DT's lyrics, which tend to be deeper with more metaphors and such. And like all heavy DT songs, it would not be complete without a jaw-dropping solo from Petrucci, and he delivers on that count. Then the original Never Enough, a song about being in an abusive relationship, with some inventive work by Rudess and Petrucci. This is one song that will stick in your head no matter what, especially the catchy pre-verse guitar riff and chorus. Follow that up with the 10+ minute Sacrificed Sons, a song about 9/11 (possibly to make up for the Metropolis 2000 original cover?) that starts soft and gets into some great rhythms later on. And then the epic title track, the 24-minute Octavarium. A masterpiece in every sense of the word, it gives A Change Of Seasons a run for its money with its sheer prog brilliance and numerous melodies and rhythms. This song is yet another proof that Portnoy, Petrucci, Rudess, and Myung are masters of the domian. Being a bass player myself, I've always admired Myung's bass work and some of the riffs he pulls off in this song make my jaw drop every time I hear them. Petrucci and Rudess have some amazing solos in this one as well, but that doesn't mean that melody is sacrificed for technicality. The five different segments of the song each have their one melodies and rhythms. James' beautiful vocals are not to be forgotten either, and he completes the song beautifully, especially with his melodic vocals backed beautifully by Myung and Portnoy in "Medicate". The song goes through so many different changes there's no way to possibly describe them all in this short review. But even though it's very long, I often find myself listening to this track three or four times a day.

In short, this album is nothing short of brilliant. I wholeheartedly agree with the reviewer who said that DT fans are among the most irrationally critical fans out there. This albums is further proof of Dream Theater's incredible ability to change, evolve, and, well, progress, showing that they will never stagnate the way so many other bands are prone to doing. This album is a must have for anyone with any sort of musical appreciation, you can take my word on that.