The Astonishing

Dream Theater - a band who blazed the trails for numerous bands of progressive metal genre strikes back with its new record. With the double-cd and two hour-long rock-opera, Dream Theater introduces us to its vision of a world in which music is created by machines.

First things first, The Astonishing is a concept album, with a certain story line and characters. With the official booklet provided with the CDs, the listener may enter this world and understand the story better. "The Astonishing" tells a story of futuristic world in which a human has no right or possibility to create his own music. It is a story of a war between The Great Northern Empire of the Americas and The Ravenskill Rebellion where "Music is playing the central role" (according to John Petrucci).

My first impression is that Dream Theater presented something very different from their previous recordings. It is because the whole album was recorded with an orchestra conducted by David Campbell. Of course, we heard it on the previous album but not in such extent. The amount of orchestral elements is impressive while there we can hear classic and also boys or gospel choirs, which gives an additional climax to this music.

As far as composition is concerned, John Petrucci and Jordan Rudess are the main heroes of this story. It is clearly audible that guitars and keyboards have the central role in here connected with Myung and Mangini supporting it in a rhythmical section. What one may find as a disadvantage of the album - you cannot expect any solo performances of John Myung or Mike Mangini, they seem to remain in a shadow of the rest. The songs themselves were composed with many interesting new ideas, which we did not hear before in DT. I mentioned gospel choirs but we can hear many memory remaining melodies and passages. Above the whole album concept, we may see that some musical themes tend to repeat which is understandable. One may perceive the whole album as a kind of official movie soundtrack due to its element of an epic.

I will give a separate paragraph for a vocal section, which concerns the performance of James LaBrie. He was a subject to discussions whether he is a good vocalist or not, but I think that in the album he have proved that he still is a strong player in the game. Having to face a quite hard task to be the voices of eight different characters required him to arrange different vocal techniques. Just listen to him in "Lord Nafaryus" or his maniacal laughter in "Three Days". The way in which he managed to perform the vocals is quite impressive.

If I had to say which songs on the album are my favorites, the answer is that I cannot just say which song is better than others are. Such judgments would be harmful statements to the album. We need to treat it as a whole. Nevertheless, if I was forced to say so I only have the impression that the first Act of the album is slightly better (with the stress on SLIGHTLY). Act 2 has also numerous and memorable moments which has driven me to tears (just listen to "Begin Again" and you will know what I mean). It is finished with a monumental "Astonishing" which somehow summarizes the album.

Nevertheless, If I was to recommend some songs to some DT newbies, I would suggest to check out "Dystopian Overture" ; "Moment of Betrayal" ; "My Last Farewell" ; "Our New World" ; "Astonishing" ; "Lord Nafaryus" ; "Three Days" or "A New Beginning". Still, you will not get the impression that you can get while listening to a whole album.

In conclusion, I think that DT did a great job and the album is certainly worth your money. It is nicely composed and performed. I am also impressed by the artwork, which you can see in the official release (provided with an original textbook, world map and portraits of the characters). I have only one word to say about the album: I am Astonished.