The first album by DT that made me yawn more than necessary and hasn't made up for it in some part of it. The Ministry Of Lost Souls is pretty good, but even that is like a mega-ballad, not an epic like Octavarium or The Count Of Tuscany or even Breaking All Illusions.

My second favorite DT album. Constant Motion kicks everyone's ass, Forsaken is very well written, Prophets Of War has some of Labrie's best vocals and a great topic with amazing lyrics. Very consistent album...

Bored out of my tree here.

Written by Boxcar Willy on 20.08.2012 at 16:56

Bored out of my tree here.

Why the hell would you start with DT with their worst album?

Although Marcel will chime in and say FII is the worst.

Written by Milena on 20.08.2012 at 19:58

Written by Boxcar Willy on 20.08.2012 at 16:56

Bored out of my tree here.

Why the hell would you start with DT with their worst album?

Although Marcel will chime in and say FII is the worst.

Heard a track on the radio, checked the whole thing, but man... BIG mistake

Written by Boxcar Willy on 20.08.2012 at 20:07

Heard a track on the radio, checked the whole thing, but man... BIG mistake

The Dark Eternal Night?

Yeah, it's pretty dull; the follow up is only sliiiightly better but it's still the same, completely wrong style. And the latest one split audiences completely, although the majority of both die-hard fans and casual fans outside of this website seem to dig it.

Enough about THOSE. If you want to try something better, consider Awake; aside from being my personal favorite, it's the darkest so it's the most fitting for you. Or Scenes From A Memory, which gets pretty elaborately wacky in the instrumental sections but has some quite rockin' tunes which might hold some appeal to you.

This album has nice artwork.



That is all.

+ 1 on the Awake recommendation - so good.

I've always considered Images and Words to be a good 'break in' album though, so that's worth a look as well.

Written by Mountain King on 08.05.2012 at 19:27

Forsaken is very well written

very well ... but not by Petrucci Long live Victor Smolski <------> listen to this song -> 'Fear' ( RAGE - 1999 )

Written by Milena on 20.08.2012 at 20:14
Enough about THOSE. If you want to try something better, consider Awake; aside from being my personal favorite, it's the darkest so it's the most fitting for you. Or Scenes From A Memory, which gets pretty elaborately wacky in the instrumental sections but has some quite rockin' tunes which might hold some appeal to you.

I would say the darkest album would be Train of Thought. Awake has very dark lyrics, but musically seen I think Train of Though is darker. It was the first album I listened to and loved the dark sound of it.

Another very good starter would be Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence. The whole album has a good mix of heavy and melo songs, so it gives you an idea of what Dream Theater sounds like.

One of Dream Theater's worst albums. The short songs (and "short" in DT context means under 7 minutes) are all pretty good or at least solid, but "The Dark Eternal Night" is one of the worst songs they ever did. The longer tracks all have both good parts and weak parts and they should all have been edited: the second half of "Repentance" may be necessary but it should be much shorter and "The Ministry of Lost Souls" is just too long for its own good. "In the Presence of Enemies" has sections that are album highlights ("Prelude", "Heretic") but also a pointless never-ending solo section ("The Reckoning"). It's still probably my favourite song on here.

I'm not sure if this album is really better than Black Clouds & Silver Linings but it's a tad more enjoyable. I still have issues with that sharp, compressed guitar sound though.

In general, this would be a great album. But not in DT's case. Unfortunately, this one wasn't that good. It just lack excitement, I don't enjoy that much the sound of it... or something like it, can't really describe my feelings rationally. I feel like they could use some more time or maybe inspiration. Damn I'm not really sure what it lacks. But it could have been better. And some songs would have be definitely needed to be remade from scratch. (Excuse my English)

Worst DT album. First song is cool but the rest... 'Forsaken' is nothing special. 'Constant Motion' is another wannabe Metallica song. 'The Dark Eternal Night' is simply terrible. What the hell is this, progressive nu metal? 'Repentance' and 'The Ministry Of Lost Souls' are both way too long and boring. Production is also bad. Why this album is ranked 8 and for example 'The Final Frontier' 7.4? Weird.

An amazing album In The Presence Of Enemies, The Dark Eternal Night, Forsaken, Constant Motion and The Ministry Of Lost Souls an absolutely solid album perhaps one of there best yet, a very influential album for any drummer out there

I don't understand why so many hatred for The Dark Eternal Night I loved this one.

Very nice album, I liked so much.

Favorite song: The Ministry of Lost Souls

This was their last "good" and meaningful album. Yeah Black Clouds has moments but the lyrics on that album are silly (Nightmare to remember, Whither, Count of Tuscany, Rite of Passage) and there were moments that made me roll my eyes. Black Clouds was when I said "Dream Theater is getting very very stale" but this album worked its magic very well for me. Yes I don't like Forsaken for being a flagrant attempt at a "single". I mean that is beneath Dream Theater to sound like an early 2000's rock band. I also find Repentance VERY underwhelming yet it still fits the overall AA suite and I still think In The Presence of Enemies is one of their greatest songs they have ever written. All the errors, flaws, mistakes, missteps, etc of this album though are completely forgivable because it was very deliberate and clearly was written with passion behind it. It felt like their were still entirely engaged and wanting to push and innovate and write good music with nothing held back. After this though the wrinkles start to show and I agree with Mike Portnoy, they needed to take a five year break.........badly. The crows feet showed on Black Clouds and they all sound so tired.

You know, usually when I revisit albums from 10 or so years ago I think "wow this stuff is great, shame I haven't revisited it in a while." Or at least something like "well, it's not that great, but I can see why I liked this so much back then."

This album though... It just sucks. I can't for the life of me understand what I thought was so great about it back then. I remember reeeaally digging a certain part of the last song, but now I just can't tell which part it was, since the whole thing is so cringey and awful. The first song is quite a good opener though. And maybe there's like one other song I like still, but other than that... yuck.

Luckily the other Dream Theater albums I liked ten years ago are still listenable.

Pretty much a meh album, although I do love In The Presence Of The Enemies pt1. The longest songs drag on for far too long and only are half interesting (In The Presence Of The Enemies pt2 and especially The Ministry Of Lost Souls, this one should have ended after the first 3 minutes) while the shortest are more or less bad (forsaken and constant motion are a purge to get through). And while I can fully enjoy some songs like Repentence or Prophets Of War (this one would have fitted better on Octavarium), it's overall a pretty disppointing experience. High 6 / low 7.

Could it be so that every album that is admired by a drummer is despised by a guitarist? Are there so many guitarists on Metalstorm?

Written by Roman Doez on 19.09.2020 at 16:45

Pretty much a meh album, although I do love In The Presence Of The Enemies pt1. The longest songs drag on for far too long and only are half interesting (In The Presence Of The Enemies pt2 and especially The Ministry Of Lost Souls, this one should have ended after the first 3 minutes) while the shortest are more or less bad (forsaken and constant motion are a purge to get through). And while I can fully enjoy some songs like Repentence or Prophets Of War (this one would have fitted better on Octavarium), it's overall a pretty disppointing experience. High 6 / low 7.

I agree with your points, but do you mind explaining why you changed your rating to a 3?

Written by 24emd on 26.12.2022 at 05:26

I agree with your points, but do you mind explaining why you changed your rating to a 3?

I now actively dislike a good chunk of the album and the rest doesn't do much for me. 3 might be a bit rough but I don't think it deserves much more than 4.

Huh? I thought I was the only one who didn't enjoy this album at all. The songs just feel so empty and the production very stale and boring. They are great musicians and the performances are great as usual, but beyond the virtuosity there isn't that much interesting stuff going on here. Most of their albums I actually really like, but this one just doesn't click with me.

Was a big dissapointing when this came out, and still is. What a boring and repetitive album, and the downfall was not even close from the last 2 works, because Octavarium and Train of tought are 9/10 albums.

Underrated imo. So interested to see so many call it "boring." I don't get that at all. Inconsistent and the vocals are not very good, but the musicianship... my God.