2010 up: Dream Theater, Marillion, Swans

When considering each of these bands various releases from 2010 until now, which of these bands that released its first studio album in the 1980s has been strongest for you? I;d be interested to hear about your particular favourite releases too (love reading the more detailed answers).

I did something similar some time back, but I wanted to focus on a few bands that released their first studio albums in the 1980s and have remained active until this decade. I had a longer list, but I wanted at least four studio albums from each of the 2010 until now period. Please try to vote for and mention one of these in a post, and then feel free to mention any other applicable ones (first studio album in the 80s, at least four studio album from 2010 until now and still active).

Dream Theater, formed 1985, first studio album 1989:

Studios:
- A Dramatic Turn of Events (2011)
- Dream Theater (2013)
- The Astonishing (2016)
- Distance Over Time (2019)
- A View From the Top of the World (2021)

Lives:
- Breaking the Fourth Wall (Live from the Boston Opera House) (2017)
- Distant Memories - Live in London (2020)
- Lost Not Forgotten Archives: Images and Words - Live in Japan, 2017 (2021)
- Lost Not Forgotten Archives: ...and Beyond - Live in Japan, 2017 (2022)
- Lost Not Forgotten Archives: Live in Berlin (2019) (2022)

Marillion, first studio album, 1983:

Marillion studio albums:
- Sounds That Can't Be Made (2012)
- F*** Everyone and Run (2016)
- With Friends From the Orchestra (2019)
- An Hour Before It's Dark (2022)

Marillion (lives)
- High Voltage (2010)
- size matters (2010)
- Distant Lights (2022) (various performance locations)
etc. etc.*


Swans, first studio album was 1983.

Swans studio albums:
- My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope to the Sky (2010)
- The Seer (2012)
- To Be Kind (2014)
- The Glowing Man (2016)
- leaving meaning. (2019)
- The Beggar (2023)

Swans lives:
- We Rose From Your Bed With the Sun in Our Head (2012)
- Not Here / Not Now (2013)
- The Gate (2015)
- Deliquescence (2017)

* Marillion is particularly expansive when it comes to live albums releases as they often will release an album for every concert date. It has at least 119 live albums. Goof for selling to the concert-goers, but I wonder if it makes it harder to have particular ones that rise to masterpiece status amongst the prognoscenti and well-informed and diverse music public generally -- it is band that seems to cater to its fans and work with them? more than most others. Swans does fund raisers with lives and EPs.

Of course it's Swans for me, and while I still don't altogether love The Beggar as much as various earlier releases -- it gets better for me as it does along - (The Seer, To be Kind and The Glowing Man in particular form this period are my favourites), it is still strong and just for the almost 44 minute "The Beggar Lover (Three)" this album would be worth owning. A very strong run, I like all of those Swans studio albums, and Deliquescence is one of my favourite live albums.

DT are my favorite band here overall, but as far as 2010- goes, I have to pick Marillion. FEAR and An Hour Before It's Dark are absolutely fantastic, and at least the band didn't have an utter dud like The Astonishing 

While Swans is the only of these three that I am into, I am interested in how popular and/or respected all three are outside of their more hardcore fans (the fanbase) and outside of the genre niches. Marillion has been said to have a really hardcore audience that is very supportive, which has been dubbed the Marillion army. Swans is armed with a big gun by having Anthony Fantano on its side. It's a band that gets a big reaction at rateyourmusic and reddit. While I have met a few huge Dream Theater fans at PA, I don't know much about its fanbase (if it still has much of one).

Anyway, yep, Swans is incredibly strong with its return. That said, I like or love every album from 1987 up from Swans.

This stretch is amazing:

It would be between Swans and Marillion here for me, but I'm incapable to make a choice yet. I abandoned Dream Theater long before and nothing of what I heard of these albums proved me wrong. Marillion is constant high quality, but it is also much of the same from one album to another (to my ears), and I only started recently to explore the more recent Swans output. Not always conquered by the entire albums, but I like most of what I heard, especially Leaving Meaning. But The Beggar easily tops all of the albums listed here from these three bands (not taking into account the live albums, because I don't know them). Maybe in a year or two I could make a choice...

Marillion by far

Prog-jester wrote: love all three bands but this poll idea is bizarre (voted Swans)

I do not want to do the kinds of polls that "everybody" else does (that's hyperbole, I want to do ones that are rather different) but please elaborate on why it is bizarre. These are three "popular"/ pretty well-known bands that released their first albums in the 80s (yes, DT only had one), and have released at least four studio albums since 2010. Normal here is the 30th Yes vs. Genesis poll though, and to me that is uninteresting. If you mean the idea of which is strongest during the period, maybe that needed some more thought to phrase and frame things better. I'm not at my best these days. I notice you made the same bizarre comment in all three of these polls, and I'm especially wondering why you were compelled to say it in all three polls. Is that your way of indicating that doing three of these lacks originality? (copying myself) Or just because you want to say almost the same thing each time but with a different band I guess.   I look forward to participating in your titillatingly normal and enchantingly ordinary polls. In all seriousness, nice to see someone vote for all three depending on the period, but I think you misunderstood the idea in the 80s one as I asked people to list a specific album if voting for Marillion or Swans (vote for and mention a specific album, in other words, that you find particularly strong -- DT only has the one, so need for people to be specific there about their votes). Like I made it clear that I was specifically voting for Swans' Children of God in the 80s and you just mentioned voting for Marillion. I could call that bizarre, but that is all too normal at PA where some people often don't read, think about, or follow the OP, let alone read through the thread before commenting, and are quick to make assumptions.

Edited by Logan - July 16 2023 at 20:50

Swans. I do like all three though. Sometimes it's very difficult to decide who to vote for in these polls! 

Well, it looks like I'm the only one who likes Dream Theater from this period.