Youssef Ziady's Blog

The veteran Progressive Metal band, Dream Theater, had set the date for the release of their new highly anticipated album, “Black Clouds & Silver Linings” which is due June 23rd. The band let us in for a sneak peek to the six-piece-record’s new material by releasing a single entitled “A Rite Of Passage” whose video clip will also be published soon.

Well, as a first impression, I guess what I can say is this is classic Dream Theater. Classic intro, very catchy main guitar riff, a melodic verse and chorus, and, of course, the undead, really technical break that would start a totally new beat and make way for a mad guitar-keyboard duel. Petrucci and Rudess never cease to amaze us with their awesome guitar solos, what’s even better is that they often turn the solos into a technique competition, and of course, succeed each time to set a higher bar. But still, I feel a little disappointed, I mean, the tune’s really great, but it’s like Dream Theater are recycling some old ideas of theirs. The whole thing’s so formulatic, and plus, it seems that they don’t make an effort to make the solo even fit in the song anymore. One might say “Yes that’s why they’re labeled Progressive” but I don’t believe that’s an excuse. In previous albums such as ‘Change of Seasons’ and ‘Scenes from a memory’, the verses, choruses and solos sounded so varied and different, yet still so relevant to each other.

Still, I think it’s real good nevertheless. Maybe the song didn’t grow in me yet. But for now, I’m really looking forward to the rest of the songs in the new record. Note that as I write this, I’m listening to the song over and over again, noticing some really cool stuff  they put into there. Oh well, I guess I’d leave it up for you to listen and judge now.

*Update*: I just found another song released from the new album, so I thought I’d update this post and share the new one entitled A Nightmare To Remember, the first track on the new DT album.

Part I:

Part II:

First-listen-notes:

- What’s up with the dominant darkness in DT’s new record.

- How the hell are they planning to perform this live?

- Do I smell blast beats at 3:56 on the second part of the song? O_O