METROPOLIS PART 2 - SCENES FROM A MEMORY

This was the album that got me into progressive rock. I was around 15 years old, and at around that time i had been devouring every RUSH album i could get my hands on as i was obsessed with Neil Peart and as an inspiring self taught drummer Mr. Peart was a huge influence on my drumming style. Then, I heard a track of Scenes of a Memory Metropolis on this site, my eyes were opened wide to the world of progressive rock and concept albums. Mike Portnoy then was teaching me along side Neil, and i acquired a double kick pedal and never looked back - i was officially a metal head and drummer almost exclusively for many years.

Since those days my tastes have evolved as is the way of the musical journey. I've found that concept albums are not my preference, as they have a tendency to be over indulgent, long winded, and lack pacing. This album has quite a lot of extra fat packed on, and frankly, most dream theater albums do. Yes, as a musician i am (well i was) impressed with the virtuosity of these musicians, but when you scour all of prog you realize talent shows itself in many different ways - these guys aren't anything out of the ordinary within the progressive rock spectrum. Dream Theater never used the less is more mantra. This dilutes the overall uniqueness of each album - long run times but much less unique ideas or stand out melodies and riffs than it looks to be on the surface.

As far as concept albums go this one loses points for the following: Overlong/pacing issues, vocally and lyrically weak and not enjoyable to my ears, musically lacks the surprises needed to keep interest over the course of the whole experience.

The positives are that this albums gains points for relevance to progressive metal as a whole, and some impressive instrumentation mechanically, but i just don't enjoy it much anymore and i certainly can't get through the entire album in one sitting which is kind of the whole point of a concept album.

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