IMAGES AND WORDS

Fall, 1992.......I'm living in Arlington, Virginia right outside Washington, DC. Three years removed from my college days I find it increasingly difficult to discover quality new bands. By this time I've pretty much abandoned radio and MTV as sources of new music. And without college friends constantly exposing me to different music I have to scrounge through music magazines and actually talk to record store hipsters (ugh!) to find interesting new music. Thus it is I vividly remember the first time I ever heard of Dream Theater. I was reading some music rag at the DC Tower Records and saw a review of what looked like a typical no-talent hair metal band. But the reviewer (who didn't like the release at all) compared them to 70's art-rock bands like Yes, saying the band had added a real metal crunch to the 70's sound. I was instantly intrigued and immediately picked up the CD (having purchased my first CD player about six months earlier). I was not impressed....again, the band LOOKED like another typical hair band, but the cover art work was cool and the length of the songs (five rang in at over 7 minutes) made me fairly certain DT was NOT your typical hair band. So I purchased my first Dream Theater CD having never heard a note of their music.

I took the disc home, sequestered myself in my bedroom (I shared a house with two roommates) and actively listened to Images and Words. I was initially impressed, as Pull Me Under did just that, pulling me into that wonderful spot when you hear compelling music for the very first time. The hypnotic guitar intro, spectacular double-bass drum work and all around musicianship instantly blew me away. I couldn't wait to hear the rest.

Song two, however, threw me in a completely different mood. The song sounded like cheesy 70's arena rock (think Styx or Journey) and I wasn't sure what to think. The song proved more interesting as it went on, and I didn't dismiss it, but it certainly was different. Now I wasn't sure what to think of DT and became more curious to hear more. From there the disc went the direction I had expected. Take The Time was progressive and yet harder edged and that's pretty much what the rest of the disc sounded like. I was disappointed, however, in the really long songs. I thought the jams and instrumental sections went on too long and were little more than self indulgences. Overall I was a little disappointed but there was enough material there to keep me coming back.

Thus throughout the next several months I kept putting IandW in my disc player. Pull Me Under became a favorite and even Another Day grew on me to the point that I considered cool; a little syrupy but had an integrity that's generally lacking in those types of "metal ballads". I also grew to like Take The Time and Surrounded...especially the piano intro and outro to Surrounded.

I never really did get into the final 30 minutes of the disc, however. Both Metropolis and Learning to Live seemed like excessive examples of hard core musicians run amok. I frequently turned the disc off before it ended. And frankly, that was about it. I never really thought much about DT or their music for years to come. In fact, it wasn't until 1997 when I picked up a used copy of A Change of Seasons that my interest in DT was rekindled. But once rekindled, my interest blazed into an engrossing compulsion.

I soon found myself listening to IandW again, especially the final part of the disc (as I was already most familiar with the first 25 minutes). While impressed the music still didn't really grab me. It wasn't until DT released Once in a Livetime in 1998 that I truly began to appreciate IandW. The live version of Take The Time compelled me to listen yet again. And THIS time the disc finally won me over completely. Metropolis and Learning to Live went from excessive indulgences to spell-binding musical displays. Having finally "gotten" what the band was trying to accomplish I can now say IandW is a semi-revolutionary release. When it came out in 1992 NOBODY was playing music like this. While the overall sound CAN be compared to arena rockers such as Styx and Kansas, the musicianship is far stronger, leaning into jazz-like solos and instrumental sections. Most compelling, however, was the willingness to abandon traditional song structures and allow the song to move wherever it needed. Thus you end up with amazing arrangement like those found in Learning to Lie, Metropolis, Surrounded and Under a Glass Moon. While these are definitely elements you find in 70's art rockers like Styx and ELP, DT added a very hard metal sound similar to Mettalica and Queensryche.

In retrospect, it's interesting that the songs I originally enjoyed the most now rank the lowest on the Mikey scale. I've heard Pull Me Under so many times that I almost always skip it; Another Day has also somewhat worn out its welcome. But whenever I listen to Metropolis, Under a Glass Moon or Learning to Live I STILL hear elements that I've never noticed before. The depth and layers of IandW still impresses. In some ways I consider it DT's best effort in that the band truly created a different type of music; they've spent the rest of their career mastering and rehashing their style but they've never really created something as innovative and unique as IandW. I still find some of the jams, while impressive, to be a little tedious and self-indulgent but still compelling. All in all a great disc and a good intro disc for potential new DT fans.