SYSTEMATIC CHAOS

Dream Theater's Systematic Chaos is a good CD. I like it a lot but the problem is two songs that are just horrible (Constant Motion and The Dark Eternal Night). I just skip those songs though and then bask in these great, rich progressive metal songs. But yes those two bad songs bring this CD down.

I feel that in particular In the Presence of Enemies part 1 and 2 are totally amazing. Critics say that Dream Theater has changed on its newest CDs (like Black Clouds and Silver Linings) and they have a point. But there are all-star songs here on this release.

Forsaken is a really good song. Minstry of Lost Souls is really good too.We have complex song structures that are heavy also.

People often say that ever since Kevin Moore left the band that the song writing quality went down. I partly agree with this. Moore was the best song writer of the group. But Mike Portnoy and John Petrucci do a good job writing lyrics, for the most part. Sometimes the lyrics are a bit goofy though I admit (I am thinking of the roughly told story told over the course of Systematic Chaos). But I think that for most progessive rock fans the main interest is the music and then much farther down the line they care about the song lyrics. For example, while I love Opeth's music, the song lyrics sometimes remind me of the poetry I wrote in my seventh grade English class.

Overall, in my opinion this is a good CD. If you are looking for a great Dream Theater CD check out Scenes from a Memory.