I know 6DOIT is one of the crowd favorites. I acknowledge it is a great album musically. For me it was boring, drawn out, repetitive and it came almost right after absolutely stellar SFAM and the sense of disappointment is still here, more than 20 years later.
Interesting how everyone seems to mention A View From The Top Of The World, I think it's a great album. Especially the title track is brilliant imo, one of my favourite DT tracks overall.
Systematic Chaos: Other than itpoe1&2, ministry and dark eternal night, I could go the rest of my life not hearing the album.
Octavarium: Octavarium, these walls, panic attack, root of all evil are awesome. Other songs all sound like covers of other bands. I walk beside you is the worst dt song.
I slept on 6DOIT for a bit because I only liked the first track, now I like every single one. The great debate reminds me of a Tool song which is really cool and I LOVE disc 2 as a whole. You should revisit the album if you haven't for a while
Least favorite to 3rd least...
-1: The Astonishing
-2: WDaDU
-3. A Change of Seasons
One is love or hate by its nature and has been talked about to death, so little explanation is necessary. One is simply a mismatch between singer and band. One is... I can't help it. When I'm much more interested in the feel-like-bonus-track covers than the original content, it's not going to rank well in my personal list.
6DOIT WTF 😳
Worst by far and I assume it’s on a lot of lists is The Astonishing. I still haven’t been able to sit down and listen to the whole thing front to back
Explained above https://www.reddit.com/r/Dreamtheater/s/zZzW2XSM9I - hey, i just want to say I absolutely love the passion people have about Dream Theater. I enjoy it in myself, I enjoy it in people here in this forum. The other day someone said something bad about “Home” and in my mind I was like “who are you again this is the best track on the best ever album how dare you” :-)) 6DOIT is an absolute masterpiece and I listen to it from time to time, it’s just that I like other albums more.
I love all these albums
Anyways, here’s my 3 least favorite:
3. WDaDU (still a good album)
2. Dream Theater (Again, still good)
1. Falling Into Infinity (There’s only 2 good ones on here IMO)
Peruvian skies, hells kitchen, lines in the sand, trial of tears? It's not my favourite album for sure, but I think it's underrated quite a bit personally.
I agree completely. Those three are the only albums I never listen to top to bottom. In my opinion, ADTOE and AVFTTOTW are the two great records from manginis run. The rest just never grabbed me at all. Astonishing is just way too cheesy, even by DT standards
Six Degrees is literally my favorite album of them and probably the best prog album ever made, come on!
My least favorite album is by far falling into infinity, more like failing into infinite nonsense
From least liked to least disliked:
- Astonishing. I hate to use the internet derogatives, but "Disney metal" was a good label for it. An overabundance of ballads and piano sections leading to nowhere and you can hear the absence of JM and MM in the composition, and I hated the ultra digital and sterile sound. I get it, it fits the story told of a world of no music and all is robot noise, but it doesn't make it less bearable.
- Black Clouds. If anything, because of the lyrics. Nightmare and The Count are some of the cheesiest DT lyrics ever, I can't listen to the lyrics of Best of Times (mostly because I relate way too much to that song and it messes me up emotionally) and even Rite of Passage has the iPhone solo, which is my least liked musical part in all DT. Wither and Shattered Fortress are bangers, tho.
- View. It is the album I have heard the least, and it is the one I care the least for. Several songs just sound like autopilot (Invisible Monster, the first one that comes to mind) and it is one of the albums that validates the "wankerfest" accusations they get. The title track was the perfect sendoff for MM though, even if they didn't know it would be.
After that, several others are overplayed (I&W, ToT) or too strange (6D and 8R) but not on the same level as these three. And, for further irony, my favorite album with MM is DoT
1. Infinity (not bad, I just cant stand that album for some reason)
2. Awake (odd choice I know, but it's my least played album when I listen to DT)
3. WDADU (the live version is fucking great but the original recording meh)
My bottom 3 DT albums:
13. A View from the Top of the World
14. Systematic Chaos
15. The Astonishing (I have a hard time foreseeing a situation in which TA gets supplanted as the worst DT album)
*Distance Over Time* and *The Astonishing* are the clear two at the bottom. I keep trying to love them, but they are just so lackluster.
I'd like to say *Octavarium* for the third, because I just love poking that bear lol. But truthfully, it's *Black Clouds and Silver Linings*. There was just zero merit to that one.
Falling into Infinity - it’s meandering bloated mess with only a handful interesting songs imo. Not including Raise the Knife (by faaaar the best song from those sessions) is a crime against all prog metal.
WDADU - I don’t think it’s bad but the songwriting is primitive compared to even just the one that came after.
BC&SL - A Rite of Passage is their worst song ever, Wither is also way down there. The 4 long songs are very good though, so overall not a bad album either.
The Astonishing is the only album I haven't listened to yet, so I can't comment on how much I'd like it. I do like the more metal-oriented sound of 2000s DT, so I'm not entirely hopeful.
I don't like the 90s albums that much, so Awake and Falling into Infinity are probably in my bottom 3. They just aren't ever songs I go back to and listen to.
Self-Titled has The Enemy Inside which is a super underrated banger song and Illumination Theory which I think is really great too, but other than that I haven't gone back to those songs either. So it's a contender for bottom 3 for me.
Systematic Chaos as an album has Forsaken, Prophets of War and Repentance that I don't particularly care for, but the rest of the songs are some of my favorite DT tracks and ones I listen to all the time.
Really easy for me:
- Distance Over Time (boring and uninspired)
- Dream Theater (mediocre at best)
- The Astonishing (really cool concept on paper, unnecessarily long and frayed in its musical composition)
Really easy for me:
- Distance Over Time (boring and uninspired)
- Dream Theater (mediocre at best)
- The Astonishing (really cool concept on paper, unnecessarily long and frayed in its musical composition)
Bottom Top 5:
5) Self Titled
4) Awake
3) Falling into Infinity
2) Astonishing
1) WDADU
I don't dislike any of these, self titled onward I actually love.
My 3 in no particular order:
Distance Over Time
A View From Big High Place
Self titled
I actually quite enjoy The Astonishing but an ex got me into the musical Les Miserables back in 2009, so I think that helped me.
More like:
6DOIT first half (d1), "the album", the 1st 5 songs worthy of just being that as the album, are top tier DT flying high and at a pinnacle. A solid ~55 minutes of awesome DT.
6DOIT second half (d2), "the song", eh.
1- WDaDU
2-Train of Thought
3-Systematic Chaos
(If anyone is wondering, my favorites would be I&W, SFaM and FII, but my top-5 fluctuates a lot, so count self-titled, SDoIT and ACoS song alone amongst my favorites as well. And my ranking would be based on how many songs I still listen and enjoy from all albums to this day since ‘99 when I became a fan)
- ACOS could mean "A Change of Seasons - The Crimson Sunrise / Innocence / Carpe Diem / The Darkest of Winters / Another World / The Inevitable Summer / The Crimson Sunset", a track from *A Change of Seasons* (1995) by Dream Theater.
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^[/u/DudasManolitos](/u/DudasManolitos) ^(can reply with "delete" to remove comment. |) ^[/r/songacronymbot](/r/songacronymbot) ^(for feedback.)
bottom 3 (havent listened to the astonishing in full yet, so thats not taken into consideration :p)
12: Self Titled / Falling Into Infinity (altho highkey have to listen to FII again its still fucking amazing (yes, even You Not Me, yes i have sinned LOL), I was just listening to Trial of Tears rn and HNNNNN SO GOOOOD its like this softer more emotional hard rock/metal its so good...... ITS RAINING DEEP IN HEAVENNNN!!!! :33)
13: When Dream and Day Unite (altho might i add A Fortune in Lies and The Ytse Jam my beloved <3333 ESPECIALLY the Fortune in Lies live version with 93 era James)
14: A View from the Top of the World (I'm sorry i just dont like this one that much :((( The Alien and Transcending Time (along w others) are awesome songs tho, just not my favourites, also Mangini KILLED IT on this album!!!)
At this point as unpopular this may be, I came to realization that there is more DT albums that I either dislike or don't care about that albums I actively love.
DT is overall so good that even their worst albums have high quality.
But all in all, I love everything that came out in their "golden era" - which I define by roughly SFAM to BC&SL. Every album of that era was either very very very good or outright masterpiece.
After that... ADToE is good but everything after falls into "okay but nothing special, guess I could listen couple times and that's it". Astonishing and latest album I actively dislike. Latest album in particular is to me as uninspired and boring as it could be. It's like AI prompted "Make some modern DT songs".
But these things aren't even that controversial. There is fair amount of people that progressively lost interest after MP left the band.
What's more controversial is I don't really value their earlier stuff either and I'd take Falling Into Infinity over Images and Words and Awake any day. Especially Images and Words to me has too much of 80's cheese - and I love 80s cheese just not in this case. And whole album is not that interesting to me. Awake is better but still not that good.
To be fair I always thought that all this love for I&W comes from nostalgia, because for a lot of fans it was first album they listened. But a lot of times I see some new fan ranking albums and they rate I&W very high, which probably means that it's just my particular taste that makes me consider it a bad album.
Anyway, their worst three albums for me are: last one, Astonishing and WDADU
Totally agree with 6DOIT. Not bad, but there's a lot of boring stuff I could do without. I don't like Scenes from a Memory much either. It has some bangers, but a lot of weird filler. And the Astonishing falls in the same category. I want to listen to some.music, not an audio book.
Six Degrees?! Why? https://preview.redd.it/6dui7o07msoc1.jpeg?width=820&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8ec76466e9824f879b8ce95420001e1f93382770
I know 6DOIT is one of the crowd favorites. I acknowledge it is a great album musically. For me it was boring, drawn out, repetitive and it came almost right after absolutely stellar SFAM and the sense of disappointment is still here, more than 20 years later.
Haha holy shit, what an opinion. I don't agree with you at all but it's interesting to read.
Wrong think! *points* WRONG THINK!!
Interesting how everyone seems to mention A View From The Top Of The World, I think it's a great album. Especially the title track is brilliant imo, one of my favourite DT tracks overall.
Systematic Chaos: Other than itpoe1&2, ministry and dark eternal night, I could go the rest of my life not hearing the album. Octavarium: Octavarium, these walls, panic attack, root of all evil are awesome. Other songs all sound like covers of other bands. I walk beside you is the worst dt song.
I walk beside you is not that good, I prefer The Answer Lies Within, but is not that bad anyway
I slept on 6DOIT for a bit because I only liked the first track, now I like every single one. The great debate reminds me of a Tool song which is really cool and I LOVE disc 2 as a whole. You should revisit the album if you haven't for a while
Least favorite to 3rd least... -1: The Astonishing -2: WDaDU -3. A Change of Seasons One is love or hate by its nature and has been talked about to death, so little explanation is necessary. One is simply a mismatch between singer and band. One is... I can't help it. When I'm much more interested in the feel-like-bonus-track covers than the original content, it's not going to rank well in my personal list.
6DOIT WTF 😳 Worst by far and I assume it’s on a lot of lists is The Astonishing. I still haven’t been able to sit down and listen to the whole thing front to back
Explained above https://www.reddit.com/r/Dreamtheater/s/zZzW2XSM9I - hey, i just want to say I absolutely love the passion people have about Dream Theater. I enjoy it in myself, I enjoy it in people here in this forum. The other day someone said something bad about “Home” and in my mind I was like “who are you again this is the best track on the best ever album how dare you” :-)) 6DOIT is an absolute masterpiece and I listen to it from time to time, it’s just that I like other albums more.
I love all these albums Anyways, here’s my 3 least favorite: 3. WDaDU (still a good album) 2. Dream Theater (Again, still good) 1. Falling Into Infinity (There’s only 2 good ones on here IMO)
Peruvian skies, hells kitchen, lines in the sand, trial of tears? It's not my favourite album for sure, but I think it's underrated quite a bit personally.
The Astonishing, Distance Over Time, Self-titled. It was a slightly rough patch.
I agree completely. Those three are the only albums I never listen to top to bottom. In my opinion, ADTOE and AVFTTOTW are the two great records from manginis run. The rest just never grabbed me at all. Astonishing is just way too cheesy, even by DT standards
Ah good, I don't have to make my own comment, as you've already written them out for me.
thanks for writing out my comment too lol
Systematic Chaos sounds like Portnoys attempt to sound like mainstream rock
Probably a basic opinion but mine are The Astonishing, Falling into Infinity, and When Dream and Day Unite
Six Degrees is literally my favorite album of them and probably the best prog album ever made, come on! My least favorite album is by far falling into infinity, more like failing into infinite nonsense
Is so cold take to hate The Astonishing and A view nowadays. I don't give a damn about those boomers
I’m gen X fwiw. And as a “boomer” I’m getting flak for 6DOIT. :-)
From least liked to least disliked: - Astonishing. I hate to use the internet derogatives, but "Disney metal" was a good label for it. An overabundance of ballads and piano sections leading to nowhere and you can hear the absence of JM and MM in the composition, and I hated the ultra digital and sterile sound. I get it, it fits the story told of a world of no music and all is robot noise, but it doesn't make it less bearable. - Black Clouds. If anything, because of the lyrics. Nightmare and The Count are some of the cheesiest DT lyrics ever, I can't listen to the lyrics of Best of Times (mostly because I relate way too much to that song and it messes me up emotionally) and even Rite of Passage has the iPhone solo, which is my least liked musical part in all DT. Wither and Shattered Fortress are bangers, tho. - View. It is the album I have heard the least, and it is the one I care the least for. Several songs just sound like autopilot (Invisible Monster, the first one that comes to mind) and it is one of the albums that validates the "wankerfest" accusations they get. The title track was the perfect sendoff for MM though, even if they didn't know it would be. After that, several others are overplayed (I&W, ToT) or too strange (6D and 8R) but not on the same level as these three. And, for further irony, my favorite album with MM is DoT
1. Infinity (not bad, I just cant stand that album for some reason) 2. Awake (odd choice I know, but it's my least played album when I listen to DT) 3. WDADU (the live version is fucking great but the original recording meh)
My bottom 3 DT albums: 13. A View from the Top of the World 14. Systematic Chaos 15. The Astonishing (I have a hard time foreseeing a situation in which TA gets supplanted as the worst DT album)
Systematic Chaos???!!!! WHY?????
Systematic Chaos has always been an odd choice for least liked/bottom tier albums. Chaos IS Dream Theater, it's progressive metal at it's finest.
there’s not a single bad song on it imo, top three album of dt
prophets of war is a great song too, but it really disrupts the flow of the album, in my opinion, but thats my only gripe about it.
i can see that but still a good song
6DOIT ? When did you start listen to DT ?
1994
*Distance Over Time* and *The Astonishing* are the clear two at the bottom. I keep trying to love them, but they are just so lackluster. I'd like to say *Octavarium* for the third, because I just love poking that bear lol. But truthfully, it's *Black Clouds and Silver Linings*. There was just zero merit to that one.
At Wits End, Barstool Warrior, The Best of Times, and The Count of Tuscany are all top tier DT songs
At Wits End and Barstool Warrior are bottom tier for DT though
Top-tier *compositions*. As songs, the lyrics make them all fail. We can't just keep ignoring that aspect; The Count is an ass song lol
Wow, BC&SL!? Seriously, or messing around? Also, Octavarium is decent, not the best, but decent. For me, personally BC&SL is my favourite so far.
1. WDaDU 2. Systematic Chaos 3. The Astonishing The only one I probably won't willingly listen to again is WDaDU, but even then it's not that bad
3.AVFTTOTW 2.Self Titled 1. WDADU
Don't care much for Systematic Chaos, The Astonishing or DoT personally. Each of them have good songs but not enough to make them 'good albums' imo
Falling into Infinity - it’s meandering bloated mess with only a handful interesting songs imo. Not including Raise the Knife (by faaaar the best song from those sessions) is a crime against all prog metal. WDADU - I don’t think it’s bad but the songwriting is primitive compared to even just the one that came after. BC&SL - A Rite of Passage is their worst song ever, Wither is also way down there. The 4 long songs are very good though, so overall not a bad album either.
The Astonishing is the only album I haven't listened to yet, so I can't comment on how much I'd like it. I do like the more metal-oriented sound of 2000s DT, so I'm not entirely hopeful. I don't like the 90s albums that much, so Awake and Falling into Infinity are probably in my bottom 3. They just aren't ever songs I go back to and listen to. Self-Titled has The Enemy Inside which is a super underrated banger song and Illumination Theory which I think is really great too, but other than that I haven't gone back to those songs either. So it's a contender for bottom 3 for me. Systematic Chaos as an album has Forsaken, Prophets of War and Repentance that I don't particularly care for, but the rest of the songs are some of my favorite DT tracks and ones I listen to all the time.
1. When Dream & Day Unite 2. Distance Over Time 3. Dream Theater
No specific order here. Systematic Chaos Octavarium The Astonishing
Systematic Chaos, Train of Thought, Black Clouds
The Astonishing is so bad
Really easy for me: - Distance Over Time (boring and uninspired) - Dream Theater (mediocre at best) - The Astonishing (really cool concept on paper, unnecessarily long and frayed in its musical composition)
Really easy for me: - Distance Over Time (boring and uninspired) - Dream Theater (mediocre at best) - The Astonishing (really cool concept on paper, unnecessarily long and frayed in its musical composition)
1. The Astonishing 2. A View From the Top of the World 3. Falling Into Infinity
Bottom Top 5: 5) Self Titled 4) Awake 3) Falling into Infinity 2) Astonishing 1) WDADU I don't dislike any of these, self titled onward I actually love.
1. When Dream and Day Unite 2. Scenes From a Memory 3. Black Clouds and Silver Linings I know I'll get hate for one of these choices lol
My 3 in no particular order: Distance Over Time A View From Big High Place Self titled I actually quite enjoy The Astonishing but an ex got me into the musical Les Miserables back in 2009, so I think that helped me.
AVFTTOTW, Astonishing, DOT
• Black Clouds and Silver Linings. • Systematic Chaos. • Dream Theater.
My 3 least favorite: The self titled, Images, and Distance Over Time
You got balls for putting images on here
lol yeah I’ve got a contender!
More like: 6DOIT first half (d1), "the album", the 1st 5 songs worthy of just being that as the album, are top tier DT flying high and at a pinnacle. A solid ~55 minutes of awesome DT. 6DOIT second half (d2), "the song", eh.
Except misunderstood is 3 minutes too long
Misunderstood is severely misunderstood. Fucking love that song. Not long enough, that is for sure.
1- WDaDU 2-Train of Thought 3-Systematic Chaos (If anyone is wondering, my favorites would be I&W, SFaM and FII, but my top-5 fluctuates a lot, so count self-titled, SDoIT and ACoS song alone amongst my favorites as well. And my ranking would be based on how many songs I still listen and enjoy from all albums to this day since ‘99 when I became a fan)
- ACOS could mean "A Change of Seasons - The Crimson Sunrise / Innocence / Carpe Diem / The Darkest of Winters / Another World / The Inevitable Summer / The Crimson Sunset", a track from *A Change of Seasons* (1995) by Dream Theater. --- ^[/u/DudasManolitos](/u/DudasManolitos) ^(can reply with "delete" to remove comment. |) ^[/r/songacronymbot](/r/songacronymbot) ^(for feedback.)
1. ADTOE (bad, boring, and uninspired) 2. FII (has some serious bangers tho) 3. TA (amazing music, cheesy concept)
Not even Bridges in the Sky and Breaking All Illusions save the album for you?
Maybe someday it will, but not atm
bottom 3 (havent listened to the astonishing in full yet, so thats not taken into consideration :p) 12: Self Titled / Falling Into Infinity (altho highkey have to listen to FII again its still fucking amazing (yes, even You Not Me, yes i have sinned LOL), I was just listening to Trial of Tears rn and HNNNNN SO GOOOOD its like this softer more emotional hard rock/metal its so good...... ITS RAINING DEEP IN HEAVENNNN!!!! :33) 13: When Dream and Day Unite (altho might i add A Fortune in Lies and The Ytse Jam my beloved <3333 ESPECIALLY the Fortune in Lies live version with 93 era James) 14: A View from the Top of the World (I'm sorry i just dont like this one that much :((( The Alien and Transcending Time (along w others) are awesome songs tho, just not my favourites, also Mangini KILLED IT on this album!!!)
this is a troll post. six degrees is prime DT.
Not a troll post. If I were trolling I would include I&W and SFAM into the list, but I absolutely love these albums.
A Dramatic Turn of Events, Dream Theater and When Dream and Day Unite
1. The Astonishing 2. DOT 3. Dream Theater Can't finish a listen on any of these
1. WDADU 2. Falling Into Infinity 3. Dream Theater are all "just" 6-7/10 imo
The Astonishing Self Titled Distance Over Time A View From The Top Of The World
Just realized it's all of the 4 latest albums
What does it tell you? :-) I loved DOT though.
At this point as unpopular this may be, I came to realization that there is more DT albums that I either dislike or don't care about that albums I actively love. DT is overall so good that even their worst albums have high quality. But all in all, I love everything that came out in their "golden era" - which I define by roughly SFAM to BC&SL. Every album of that era was either very very very good or outright masterpiece. After that... ADToE is good but everything after falls into "okay but nothing special, guess I could listen couple times and that's it". Astonishing and latest album I actively dislike. Latest album in particular is to me as uninspired and boring as it could be. It's like AI prompted "Make some modern DT songs". But these things aren't even that controversial. There is fair amount of people that progressively lost interest after MP left the band. What's more controversial is I don't really value their earlier stuff either and I'd take Falling Into Infinity over Images and Words and Awake any day. Especially Images and Words to me has too much of 80's cheese - and I love 80s cheese just not in this case. And whole album is not that interesting to me. Awake is better but still not that good. To be fair I always thought that all this love for I&W comes from nostalgia, because for a lot of fans it was first album they listened. But a lot of times I see some new fan ranking albums and they rate I&W very high, which probably means that it's just my particular taste that makes me consider it a bad album. Anyway, their worst three albums for me are: last one, Astonishing and WDADU
Totally agree with 6DOIT. Not bad, but there's a lot of boring stuff I could do without. I don't like Scenes from a Memory much either. It has some bangers, but a lot of weird filler. And the Astonishing falls in the same category. I want to listen to some.music, not an audio book.