TRAIN OF THOUGHT

I remember when I found out about Dream Theater. My first Dream Theater album was Falling Into Infinity (1997) that I bought around 2001 or so and I liked the album. After that, a friend of mine that had all their albums borrowed me his CDs telling me to pay close attention to Images And Words (1992) and Awake (1994).

Honestly speaking, I didn't like those albums (as my Images And Words review here states). Everyone seems to praise them as the best moments of the American band, on my behalf I say that they have very good compositions with a TERRIBLE overall sound. I really don't like the early 90's approach to how the albums were produced and DT is no exception. Everything started to change with A Change Of Seasons (1995) and its great suite.

The band's peak was between 1999 and 2002 and they released Scenes From A Memory (1999) and Six Degrees Of Inner Turbulence (2002). Scenes is an album that takes you completely into their world with innovative approach and great music and ideas. Six Degrees is another step further on the creative line and culminates in the 45 minutes long suite.

Do you see my point here? The band was trying hard to increase the quality of their work with each release, going to new and unexplored areas. When the time for a new album came, the band could follow the same pattern, try something new and bold again, but instead?. They went for the Train Of Thought (2003) album.

Now, Train Of Thought (2003) is not a bad album, no it isn't. The problem here is that the stagnation that follows the band 'till this very day started really here. You have great tracks as 'As I Am' and 'Honor Thy Father' but in general it feels?. Normal. Too normal. In a way the album is just disappointing because it doesn't go anywhere, it's just a collection of songs. This may not be really bad in a way, but I don't find the songs on the album remarkable in any way. On top of that I really dislike James LaBrie voice here, usually people tend to tolerate his voice (which is indeed a really bad voice), but I find it annoying most of the time in Train Of Thought (2003).

The band would go further with 2 more studio albums with Potnoy and 2 more with Mangini and they would never reach their peak again. And the big problem is not that, the big problem is that they don't even try. Sad to see that Portnoy was right, after all.