{"id":29025,"date":"2025-02-26T05:30:34","date_gmt":"2025-02-26T10:30:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=29025"},"modified":"2025-02-12T16:00:29","modified_gmt":"2025-02-12T21:00:29","slug":"dream-theaters-third-act-commences-with-parasomnia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2025\/02\/26\/dream-theaters-third-act-commences-with-parasomnia\/","title":{"rendered":"Dream Theater\u2019s Third Act Commences with \u2018Parasomnia\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

With founding drummer back in the fold, progressive metal heroes return for 16<\/i>th<\/i><\/sup> studio album<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n

One of prog-metal\u2019s most acclaimed groups has returned to its roots \u2013 and its most celebrated lineup \u2013 for a new album and tour. Dream Theater\u2019s Parasomnia<\/i> was released February 7, and the group\u2019s 40th<\/sup> anniversary tour takes it to cities across the U.S.<\/p>\n

Dream Theater began in 1985 and hit its stride when vocalist James LaBrie joined a few years later. The band\u2019s second album, 1992’s Images and Words<\/i> initiated a streak of briskly-selling and critically-acclaimed releases. The band\u2019s fifth LP, 1999\u2019s conceptually-based Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory<\/i> marked the recorded debut of Dream Theater\u2019s classic lineup: LaBrie plus guitarist John Petrucci, bassist John Myung, drummer Mike Portnoy and keyboardist Jordan Rudess.<\/p>\n

That prolific and creatively fertile lineup would yield six studio albums and four live albums. Following the release of 2009\u2019s Black Clouds & Silver Linings<\/i>, Portnoy left the band; he would go on to take part in myriad other projects including the progressive supergroup Transatlantic.<\/p>\n

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After more than 12 years away from the group he had co-founded, Portnoy rejoined Dream Theater in 2023. With the classic lineup back together, the band began work on its 16th<\/sup> studio album. Parasomnia\u2019<\/i>s loosely conceptual nature has been earning critical praise, and within days of release the album shot to the top spot on metal album charts.<\/p>\n

Not that Dream Theater experienced a slump during its years without Portnoy, but the new album feels like a return to form. \u201cOne of the things that having Mike back in the band brought to us,\u201d says Rudess, \u201cwas a love for elements we\u2019ve had in our albums in the past: conceptual connections and repeating themes.\u201d Rudess admits that those elements weren\u2019t always readily obvious, \u201cbut the fans could find them if they looked hard enough.\u201d<\/p>\n

The simpatico that the five musicians had established back in the early 2000s made sessions for the new album go smoothly. \u201cIt all came together quickly as soon as we put our hands on our instruments,\u201d Rudess says, noting that the album\u2019s theme \u2013 the range of experiences humans encounter when suffering disruptive sleep disorders \u2013 \u201crevealed itself very quickly in that process.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dream Theater\u2019s trademark synthesis of power and subtlety \u2013 and of technical instrumental mastery applied to emotionally relatable song craft \u2013 is a product of the musical camaraderie among its members. For his part, Rudess \u2013 a Juilliard-trained musician, educator, software developer and winner of many best-keyboardist polls \u2013 revels in what he calls sonic discovery. \u201cIf I\u2019m sitting in a room and all of a sudden somebody somehow \u2013 with whatever \u2013 makes an interesting sound, I go, \u2018Wow, that was cool!\u2019 And I\u2019m always interested in asking, \u2018How else<\/i> can you make cool sounds?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Rudess brings that sense of wonder and adventure to his work with Dream Theater. \u201cWhen I\u2019m in the studio, I feel like I have a giant palette, almost like a painter,\u201d he says. \u201cI love the feeling of, \u2018I\u2019ve got every color here. All I have to do is dip my paintbrush into this one. Oh, and that\u2019s<\/i> cool. I’ll blend it with a little bit of this<\/i>.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

In Dream Theater, the traditional metal configuration of guitar-bass-drums-vocals is imbued with layers of nuance and power thanks to Rudess\u2019 keyboard wizardry. \u201cI get to be the orchestrator,\u201d he says. \u201cI get to be the choir. I get to be the piano and organ guy and the Clavinet guy. And I get to be special effects guy, and the spacey pads and weird sounds guy. That\u2019s my world!\u201d<\/p>\n

Sound textures are only part of the equation; the coolest sound in the world amounts to little if it\u2019s not combined with a strong melodic line. Dream Theater\u2019s collaborative approach \u2013 all of the group\u2019s music is credited to all five musicians \u2013 involves a great deal of give-and-take. \u201cIf [John Petrucci\u2019s] guitars are playing some kind of chunky riff, I\u2019m either going to double it or find a nice chordal thing to go over it so that I can shape the harmonics,\u201d Rudess explains. He says that he and his band mates share a common goal when composing and arranging Dream Theater\u2019s music: \u201cWe\u2019re looking for something that feels really powerful; we want to feel the energy when we\u2019re writing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parasomnia<\/i>\u2019s opening track, \u201cIn the Arms of Morpehus\u201d introduces several musical motifs. As the album unfolds, its thematic unity is reinforced by the strategic recurrence of those motifs. The connectivity of the songs is a kind of corollary to the re-establishment of Dream Theater\u2019s classic lineup. \u201cIt\u2019s incredible on so many levels to have Mike Portnoy back in the band,\u201d Rudess says. \u201cOn one level it\u2019s personal, because he and I have been friends ever since we met. But it\u2019s also fantastic because of all the amazing [musical] things he brings, even beyond his beautiful drumming.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recording \u2013 and now heading out on tour \u2013 with the lineup that made many of Dream Theater\u2019s most acclaimed records feels like a new beginning. \u201cIt\u2019s like, \u2018We\u2019re back; we\u2019re starting over again,\u2019\u201d Rudess says. \u201cWith all eyes on us for this next year [of touring], I think that will lead to whatever’s next for us. We just have to keep our eyes open and enjoy the flow.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With founding drummer back in the fold, progressive metal heroes return for 16th studio album One of prog-metal\u2019s most acclaimed groups has returned to its roots \u2013 and its most […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29026,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,46,49,56],"tags":[719,4033],"class_list":["post-29025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","category-metal","category-new-release","category-prog","tag-dream-theater","tag-jordan-rudess","cat-41-id","cat-46-id","cat-49-id","cat-56-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29025","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29025"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29025\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29029,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29025\/revisions\/29029"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}