I’ve been a fan of Dream Theater since roughly around Scenes From A Memory. Everything from the blinding musicianship, to the complex orchestration and indulgence in odd time signature shenanigans has been utterly captivating over the last couple of decades.

With some minor exceptions,and this is one of them.

This might sound odd, but I never really thought of DT as a metal band first, Prog band second. I mostly prefer the records up to and including Train Of Thought with the distinct exception of Octavarium. Which, along with Scenes From A Memory and Six Degrees Of Inner Turbulence, I consider to be something of a Masterpiece. As such I think of DT as a Prog band first and Prog Metal band second…. If that makes sense. It’s a subtle distinction.

Now given the circumstances and set of events leading up to Mike Portnoy’s return to the band, which included and commenced with Liquid Tension Experiment 3…. I was expecting something a little more… “off the beaten path” from this first teaser from their forthcoming album ” Parasomnia” scheduled for release in February of 2025.

I explain why in this video: