Dream Theater- The Astonishing (2016)

Dream Theater- The Astonishing (2016)

By: Ghost Writer

Progressive metal band Dream Theater is back with a record perfectly well suited for our everything goes post future days, and that's perhaps what The Astonishing is all about, as far as concept goes, The Astonishing touches the theme of rebellion against "the empire", a concept not too far removed from what we are all living these days, of course, in a prog band concept is a big part of the picture, but in the case of the band, music will always be the principal player.

The opener, titled as Dystopian Overture quickly sets the pace, a great interplay between Jordan Rudess epic keyboards and John Petrucci evil guitar riffing, developing later into something more subtle with beautiful playing by both musicians, perfectly anchored by the powerful drumming if Mike Mangini, as the band progresses here perfectly from tempo to tempo never losing the tension, recalling the work of prog greats, specially Genesis, which immediately comes to mind here.

Important is to recognize the amazingly fluid work of James LaBrie on vocals, a man who has perfectly adapted to the dynamics of the band and whose vocal work is simply excellent, flying high on tunes like the highly melodic The Gift of Music, featuring also the always muscular bass work of John Myung perfectly coordinated with the drum work of Mangini in what seems to be the most incredible prog rhythm section since the glory days of Rush.

For The Answer the band shows a very accessible side, mainly thanks to the wide vocal range of LaBrie, who goes into pure epic drama, recalling sometimes old metal power ballads, but perfectly backed by a virtuoso string section, linking perfectly with the ascending A Better Life, the band creating here a complex backing melody for LaBrie again to go more for the feel of the song, right before going into the Genesis book of prog drama featured on Lord Nafaryus that even touches tango in a tangential way.

As you can expect, The Astonishing, a massive double recording stretches the concept to the extreme, is a good piece but one whose length plays a little against itself, but the band, all of them superb players manages to land it safely, the band still plays hard and heavy and is talented enough to go into really intricate passages, but LaBrie, Petrucci and Rudess shine like seasoned veterans carrying the whole monumental project to the port, leaving us with one of the first astonishing records of the year.