624. Dream Theater / A Dramatic Turn of Events. 2011. 3/5

The lead-up to this album being written, recorded and released was overshadowed by the circumstances regarding drummer Mike Portnoy quitting the band he had helped to form. The months spent producing the album had stories passing back and forth over what had happened and why. In the long run, despite his obvious importance to most parts of the Dream Theater machine, it was going to be interesting to see what the band would produce given that his sway had now left the process.

I think every Dream Theater album is beginning to morph into each other, such is the similar nature of the song structure and sound of the songs on them all. The opening track "On the Backs of Angels" is a good song, but it's in the same element as most of their opening songs. James La Brie even seems to be singing in the same pitch location. What are they doing, just bringing out the same mold each time and casting the same elements? That's not quite accurate of course, but in many ways it's a lot closer to the truth. "Build Me Up, Break Me Down" and "Lost Not Forgotten" are also atypical Dream Theater movements, combining the melding of keyboards and guitar whilst the bass holds the song together underneath these elements.
From here on in though, it becomes really hard work. I know Dream Theater have made an art form of 10 minute plus compositions, but truly, unless you have enough in them to retain the interest, you begin to look for the 'skip' button. On past albums they have done it in magnificent fashion on any number of songs - "A Change of Seasons", "The Glass Prison" and pretty much the entire Train of Thought album - but here I confess it just seems like the songs drag on forever, and begin to blend from one to the next. "Bridges in the Sky", "Outcry" and "Breaking All Illusions" are only broken up by dis-interesting ballad "Far From Heaven", before finishing with the less than inspiring "Beneath the Surface".

I've no doubt that the hard core Dream Theater fans will again consider this album to be a triumph and praise its claims to the heavens. Personally I have struggled to be completely enthused about a Dream Theater album since in the imperial Train of Thought. While the musicianship continues to be of the highest class, the songs to me just aren't holding my interest throughout. Comparing this to fellow progressive metal outfit Symphony X's last two album's, Paradise Lost and Iconoclast they just aren't in the same street. I'm not proclaiming that the end is nigh for Dream Theater, but I know where my preferences have switched to in recent years, and I'm not sure whether they can be retrieved from that direction. This is not a bad album by any means, but it just isn't a super one that you expect from this band.