DREAM THEATER „Systematic Chaos”

Music: Progressive Metal
Website: www.dreamtheater.net
Country: USA
Duration: 78:40 (8 songs)


Cool songs: In The Presence Of Enemies Pt.1/2, The Dark Eternal Night, Repentance

The band, which is perceived as one of the leaders in progressive music, is always faced with a difficult task. On the one hand, they have to develop their music and bring some new elements into it, but at the same time satisfy the fans who don’t often accept the radical changes. It is typical for DREAM THEATER to change their style quite significantly after each album. ‘Scenes From A Memory’ was almost a perfect progressive album, then ‘Six Degrees Of Inner Turbulence’ was more experimental, at least on the first CD. ‘Train Of Thought’ must have been a great surprise, as the band created a fully metal album from the beginning to the very end, although still characteristic to their style. ‘Octavarium’ was more neutral, it contained heavy and long tracks as well as more mellow ones. What’s more, the title song was a quite successful trial to make a real progressive suite.

The new album is once again a more visible comeback to heavier sound, but not so radical as in ‘Train Of Thought’. There are more melodies in the songs, the band created another great ballad, so everything is in perfect order.

The opening track, ‘In The Presence Of Enemies Pt.1’, is a typical DREAM THEATER song. It starts with an outstanding instrumental introduction. The guys always had a gift for finding balance between melodic and heavy parts and this song is a great example. ‘Forsaken’ is a more ballad type of song. LaBrie’s voice is very emotional especially in the refrain, which makes the track very catchy. It seems that the band wanted to be noticed on the hit lists with that one, as it was released as a second single from the album. ‘Constant Motion’ and the next one could have been issued on ‘Train Of Thought’ album thanks to the intensity and heaviness, which pervade in that part of the album. The song contains great twisted riffs and dynamic drums, which are so typical of the abovementioned album. The only thing that may irritate some people is the catchy refrain done by LaBrie and Portnoy. ‘The Dark Eternal Night’ is dominated by heavy metal riffs and double bass on drums. The middle part is a typical instrumental improvisation, which will surely make many people envious of the musicians’ skills.

‘Repentance’ is an extraordinary ballad, which deserves some separate attention. It is another song devoted to Mike Portnoy’s alcohol rehab process. The whole track is very atmospheric and has a beautiful John Petrucci’s solo. The climax comes when we hear the real apologies made by various musicians who agreed to admit to their own faults. It’s hard to recognize all of them, but among others, there are Steven Wilson, Dave Ellefson and Mikael Akerfeldt.

‘Prophets Of War’ is sort of an anti-war statement. Musically, it reminds me of the band called MUSE, mainly due to the characteristic background motif and LaBrie’s style of singing. The song has a very positive feeling and motivating lyrics. ‘The Ministry Of Lost Souls’ is very long and complicated. It starts calmly with beautiful melodies, then the middle part is full of instrumental battles between the members of the band. In my opinion, this fragment could have been a bit shorter. The album ends with ‘In The Presence Of Enemies Pt.2’ which is obviously a continuation of the opening song. One of the biggest advantages is LaBrie’s passionate and versatile singing. He uses various forms of expression in that one and he is undoubtedly the main hero of the song. Musically, the song presents a typical DREAM THEATER style, full of pace changes and twisted solos.

‘Systematic Chaos’ stirs our attention with great production. Everything sounds just perfect. It is visible that the band was well prepared for the recording session as the arrangements of the songs are very complicated, however this aspect is always characteristic of them. For some people, the only problem may be the length of the songs and some longer not easily digestible instrumental parts. Apart from this, the album will surely satisfy most of the listeners.

note: 9/10

Tracklist

01. In The Presence of Enemies Pt.1
02 Forsaken
03 Constant Motion
04 The Dark Eternal Night
05 Repentance
06 Prophets Of War
07 The Ministry Of Lost Souls
08 In The Presence Of Enemies Pt.2

Line-up

James LaBrie – vocals, percussion
John Petrucci – guitar, vocals
Jordan Rudess – keyboards
John Myung – bass, Chapman Stick
Mike Portnoy – drums and percussion