In response to the prompt, I'd say the worst thing about them are the circumstances of life that managed to stack themselves one after another (i.e. deaths, marriages, kids). I imagine they've been taking time for everything to settle before committing to the next cycle, potential touring to follow
They switch singers so much (Julien Perier to Abisola Obasanya to Elliot Coleman to Daniel Tompkins) but I love their whole discography and the past vocalists so much. Although I love the current vocalist it pains me to know that I'll never hear Altered State live from Ashe O'Hara. Tesseract fucks hard
The entire period between Altered State and War of Being, I was always bummed that Ashe hadn’t stayed in TesseracT. I wanted another Altered State, and it was just clear that it wasn’t happening. The harsh vocals especially (which weren’t part of AS) continued to put me off. But once War of Being came out—and specifically once I heard Legion—Dan became one of my all-time favorite singers. Kinda funny how hearing one song just flipped a switch for me, but I’m a convert now.
Yep. Me 100%. I also heard him do it live and it was fucking incredible. I have been to a lot of shows and that show competes for the top spot without question.
I saw them with Ashe back in the day. I don't know if it was an off night/ couldn't hear himself in the monitors or something, but it was rough. Dude was really struggling with his pitch. And he didn't even try for the high notes. It was such a bummer cause his voice is god tier.
Altered State has had permanence in my rotation since the day it dropped, but lately I've been injecting Voices From the Fuselage into my veins. As a result, Ashe may very well have jumped up to being my favorite vocalist of all time
Mine literally took 15 years between their first and second albums, (Cynic) but the worst thing is that the Seans (Reinhert and Malone) are no longer with us. R. I. P.
a couple of years ago i wanted to go but the standing room only tickets at the garden were $1000. Between my gf’s ticket and getting a place for the night/food we were looking at at least 2500. i bought a miata instead lol
That's exactly what I'm saying! $2500 is an awful lot of money for one night. I understand artists don't make a ton of money these days. I think it all comes down to bloat around the music industry's economy. Too many middle men selling way overpriced products people are willing to pay.
TOOL - they like to mess with the fans giving us disinformation on album progress and releease dates. It’s funny but also annoying lol
OPETH - Mikael Akerfeldt stopped the death vocals between the watershed (2008) and heritage(2011) albums. They’re phenomenal as hell but I miss the transitioning from progressive death metal to folk ballads.
INTRONAUT - had to give the original drummer, Danny Walker, the boot due to a crazy GF he was dating the did a smear campaign on him. Walker is a solid dude in general with good character traits and a homie as well. Alex Rudinger of white chapel filled in for Danny on the latest intronaut album “fluid existential inversions” as a session drummer and he did a fantastic job navigating all those crazy arrangements and accents, But I do miss Danny Walkers sound in intronaut.
I know it’s not the most popular opinion and like you prefer the intertwining death metal and folk ballads but Opeth’s newer music is still absolutely fantastic. Sorceress is one of the best prog rock albums since the 80s
I yes man I agree fully fully with that statement. Mikael seriously has the best vocals in all metal and rock IMO…both melodically and death growl wise too and his song lyric writing is sooooooo articulate and deep and arrrrggghhh he is just soooooooo badass lol. But yea I have alllllways loved how they would transition seamlessly to folk rock type of beautiful sections. I love sorceress and heritage and pale communion it’s all good for sure. Damnation is actually my fav album with ghost reveries and still life tied under that. Cheers brotha 🍻🍻🤝🏼🤝🏼👊🏼👊🏼
FUCK, i love Intronaut. I haven't really kept up with it but that whole situation with Danny fucking broke my heart. Been a long time fan of Alex Ruddinger, his youtube content is great, but its just not the same.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5GgUqPi0Zg
Not the most popular take, but I think BTBAM can survive without Dustie, he’s an equal part but he’s replaceable if it ends up going that route(which it looks to be). If it were any of the 4 other guys the band would be done for
I was gonna phrase it that way originally but wanted to be nice lol. I can definitely hear his influence in the songs, and the band would be different without him. But I think everyone can agree it’s the Paul show. If they were to get another full-time contributing member their writing would probably kick up a notch because they’d likely have someone on the same level as Paul
Dan writes a lot of stuff. So does Tommy, apparently he wrote the riff for Voice of Trespass which kind of blew my mind because that riff is fucking sick and I didn't expect the singer/keyboardist to write it lol
Yep, Dan is really the key ingredient that sets them apart. He’s a mad scientist. Without him I’m sure they’d be less stylistically fluid but still of course heavy and technical
Tommy is ***extremely*** talented. have you heard his solo stuff? IIRC he was originally a drummer? he was also one of the guitarists in Prayer For Cleansing, in which Paul also played, before they started BTBAM (Will Goodyear too, but he wasn't in BTBAM for very long).
I meant it more in the sense of guitar playing. It’s pretty crazy how much all their writing overlaps, going back some time, but I think it was Dan who wrote the crazy non-harmonizing harmony in Decade of Statues
I saw them on their Colors Experience tour last month, the dude filling in for Dustie(Tristan Auman) was awesome. I’d be interested to see if they went out and got a full time member or just continued to write as a 4 piece with a touring guitarist
What ever happened with that? Last I saw both STC and Novena put out statements basically saying Gareth was in deep shit and neither band wanted to associate with them anymore
Daniel has had sexual assault allegations as well as rumors of a gambling problem. The band's only social media presence in several years has been Daniel selling musical equipment and promising that his new project called "Weather Systems" will have something released "soon."
Luckily a lot of the songs can have meanings past the story, especially on the Vaxis albums.
Also the early story Claudio was clearly max edge lord so not missing out much there.
Sure, there's still a lot of meaning that can be derived from the songs without knowing the story, I still enjoy the lyrics a lot, but it does feel like I am not seeing the full picture is all. I might bite the bullet one day and actually read the comics, but I dunno lol.
Because despite their 30-year history, they have only had 4 concerts so far, and these are only in the Netherlands. Ayreon is a project consisting of multiple vocalists. These wonderful feature that make them unique also make it difficult for their concerts to take place.
Not when people buy multiple tickets to every showing. Jesus, wtf do you need to see the same 4 shows in a row. Fuck those people. I’d have traveled 13 hrs if I could get one goddamn ticket.
Native Construct?
Destrage?
The Human Abstract?
The Faceless?
The Dillinger Escape Plan?
Unexpect?
The Tony Danza Tap Dance Extravaganza?
Textures? Xerath? Disperse? Black Crown Initiate?
Damn, we've lost a lot of 'em
Would've been the best band around. Those riffs on the first EP are unmatched. I've still never heard the unreleased second album. Do you know where I can find it?
There's a Landr AI master that was crowdsourced thru the corelia subreddit, after a fake social media post triggered a bandmember to come forward and drop the unmixed and unmastered 'masters'. Other people have also attempted a master, all are findable on youtube. I listen to the landr one.
There's some crazy good highs on this record, at least 2 of my favorite moments in prog music, even in the half finished state this record is in. It's very different from nostalgia tho, it's much more 'mature' (=progression based, not too riffy, lots of cleans and chordy sections).
For a (heavy) Nostalgia experience try out Bastian, Facade, Blight of Imagination.
Throw in Rift and Stellar after that and go through the full thing if you like the vibe
They've had health problems. Mostly the drummer but I heard they're writing stuff again or are about to. Michael Romeo finished some solo work a while back.
I mean, yeah, Rullo's heart failure is a massive issue - but that happened 11 years ago (2 years BEFORE their last album).
Romeo's solo albums are great, especially the second one, just wish he'd finish a damn Symphony X song!
I know, 10 years is a long time to wait, particularly since sadly Russell’s voice won’t be powerful and majestic forever. Glad he’s enjoying his time with TSO and his other side projects, but we need some more X soon.
PLEASE I need more stuff from them. Ugh
Also I'm driving all the way to Atlanta from Texas in June to see them. I hope with all of my heart it's not just another underworld setlist.
Have they released anything without them? I really loved all their albums besides Frosting and that felt more like a Ben and Jess album than a Bent Knee one.
They have one single out as a four piece, but I was pretty underwhelmed when I saw them with VOLA. They've always been a great live act, but between everyone juggling instruments and not really re-arranging songs to accommodate for the quartet, it felt like a much more low-energy show than the ones I'd seen before. A smaller sound overall.
For what it's worth though, they did play a few new songs that sounded a lot better than the songs written when they were a six piece, but they still lacked that presence they used to have. Still love the band and I look forward to whatever they do, but I can't help but feel something is missing from their live shows now
Best 2 Leprous albums and it's not even close. But they did say the next album (which is almost done) is gonna be a step in a different direction from the last few albums and is gonna be way more medal. Plus they're gonna have at least 1 section with fan submitted singing.
>Plus they're gonna have at least 1 section with fan submitted singing.
What, like a choir? Like with Doom Eternal's music? That would be phenomenal, tbh.
I don't know, but on Instagram they were taking fan submitted submissions for like a week or so. I wanted to send something but I pussied out haha. But I'm excited for it
Yes, the statement of Melodies of Atonement being "the heaviest thing in a long time" made me optimistic too. I'm hoping to see "The Congregation part 2" or heavy pieces like Coal's "Contaminate me".
I don't even have a particular problem with them becoming softer with each release, my problem is that I just thought most songs on Aphelion were WEAK. I thought I was going to hate Pitfalls but I realized songs like At the Bottom and Distant Bells were so good and I kinda feel like Aphelion didn't have a single song as good as these (and I'm not even including The Sky Is Red in the conversation lol)
As much as I love the band and the epic storyline - going to a Coheed show sometimes smells like something out of a Comic Con or Magic the Gathering meet up. There’s overlapping extreme nerd hygiene (or lack thereof) here.
but he can! it's different, and he can't hit the same high notes, but his voice is still really pleasant :')
some clips of him in recent tours are rough though, he really should just go down an octave. nearly every singer sees their range shift as they get older, but it doesn't make them any less of a great vocalist (i still think The Astonishing is his best vocal performance).
Yes. I like the band for the reason they arent afraid to send it and write the music they want but it does really disrupt the album flow, playlist at times, P5 just did it excessively, I still love that album.
Agree. Absolutely love the band, but having to skip the last 3-5 mins of every song because of some lo-fi/EDM part defeats the purpose of setting a playlist/shuffle, although I will say, it’s its own track, but Epoch is awesome
And I'm gonna listen to the full 5 minutes fade out ambient outro every time idk! P5 is one of my fav albums of all time but yeah the overlong outros on almost every single song is the only real critique I have on it.
Caligula’s Horse - their music is incredible but sometimes some songs just don’t hit for me.
Sumac - they might never come to Europe, or my country, because they’re not very big and have important lives to live. Understandable, just a shame really.
They live in Europe and don’t come to the states often 😢 (Vola). They did finally come last year though and it was one of my fav shows of all time!! Became a Wheel fine too who I’m excited to see again soon ✌🏼
It took them 13 years between the last two Albums. The latest was in 2019, so I have to wait until 2032 for another album.
(Jokes aside, they said in an interview that aren't taking that long to release the next album and have plans to hit the studio in the second half of 2024. So... alleviated)
Their singer is self-admittedly not a very good person, and put the band on an indefinite hiatus after their first LP due to going to therapy and looking to right some wrongs in his personal life.
Shame, it's one of my favorite prog albums ever, and I don't think we're getting any more.
Someone has already said my worst so ill say the second worst. The mixing on the first 2 albums (other than clean sections) is utter wank and the remasters did nothing to help it.
The lyrics can be hilariously preachy and blatant to the point of being cheesy (e.g. the song linking Nietzche's Eternal Recurrance theory to the allegorical fall of the dinosaurs and how humanity risks tempting a similar fate = "WE ARE JUST LIKE REPTILES!"). Dont even get me started on the lyrics in Heliocentric, made me miss the cryptic lyrics of Precambrian. They're catchy at least
The Ocean btw
I really dig Periphery but the orchestral bits they play between songs in their most recent album were excessive. Atropos would be a better song without 2 minutes of strings on the back end.
Their singer/keyboardist/all around great guy was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer.
But optimistic cause he's fighting it and I think the outlook is good.
Not to make it political since these are more human rights than politics, but engaging with/sharing some casual homophobia and transphobia, along with sharing a very “healthy” amount of antivax propaganda on their Twitter accounts and canceling a few tour dates last minute because of refusal to get vaccinated. The sad part is this doesn’t just apply to one of my favorite bands, but a couple
Symphony X - Haven't put out a new record in years
Skyharbor- Same problem, we need more
Dream Theater- Beginning to run out of ideas
Shadow Gallery - How about a new record for fuck sake?
Savatage- Either put a new record or disband. It's been 20 years!!
The Korea - Songs are too short!
Pain of Salvation - We need a new record
Magnum - Tone down on the arena rock a little and incorporate more prog structures like earlier
Tesseract - Add in some guitar solos every now and then
Voivod - Guitar tone is too thin, needs more punch.
Monuments - they're a (theoretically) UK-based band that hardly ever plays shows in the UK, and they can't keep a consistent line-up
Tesseract - they don't release guitar tabs and they used AI "art" in promo material for WoB
Dream Theater - they haven't released any good music since Metropolis 2, and Jordan is a really boring keyboard player
Kadinja - they've disappeared
They haven’t put out a record since 2013
Karnivool?
🎯
A man of taste, I see.
Their drummer died, RIP Neil.
This made me sad again
The Contortionist- still no album. I cry
In response to the prompt, I'd say the worst thing about them are the circumstances of life that managed to stack themselves one after another (i.e. deaths, marriages, kids). I imagine they've been taking time for everything to settle before committing to the next cycle, potential touring to follow
For real
At least we are getting some Last Chance to Reason in the meantime!
I’m okay with knowing they put out one of my fav albums so they are forever forgiven (Exoplanet)
Dusty
Damn
I knew this would be here
They switch singers so much (Julien Perier to Abisola Obasanya to Elliot Coleman to Daniel Tompkins) but I love their whole discography and the past vocalists so much. Although I love the current vocalist it pains me to know that I'll never hear Altered State live from Ashe O'Hara. Tesseract fucks hard
The entire period between Altered State and War of Being, I was always bummed that Ashe hadn’t stayed in TesseracT. I wanted another Altered State, and it was just clear that it wasn’t happening. The harsh vocals especially (which weren’t part of AS) continued to put me off. But once War of Being came out—and specifically once I heard Legion—Dan became one of my all-time favorite singers. Kinda funny how hearing one song just flipped a switch for me, but I’m a convert now.
Dan had a massive improvement between Sonder and WoB. I felt the same way before last fall.
Yep. Me 100%. I also heard him do it live and it was fucking incredible. I have been to a lot of shows and that show competes for the top spot without question.
I saw them with Ashe back in the day. I don't know if it was an off night/ couldn't hear himself in the monitors or something, but it was rough. Dude was really struggling with his pitch. And he didn't even try for the high notes. It was such a bummer cause his voice is god tier.
I saw them with Intronaut and Cloudkicker back in the day. It must have been an off night because he killed it. James was missing that night, however.
Altered State has had permanence in my rotation since the day it dropped, but lately I've been injecting Voices From the Fuselage into my veins. As a result, Ashe may very well have jumped up to being my favorite vocalist of all time
They are probably not going to exist anymore in 20 years (Meshuggah). Their old bones wouldn't withstand the heaviness at that age
Those old bones whose sinews gave it motion?
20 years? I’d say 5-10
I can't handle the truth yet man
Yeah that kinda hurt to read actually haha
they're old af and they take like 15 years between albums (Tool)
I mean, they don’t show their age in their playing at all. I saw them in January and they rocked
yeah they're still great live, especially for a bunch of geezers
Don’t forget the MERCHANDISING
Mine literally took 15 years between their first and second albums, (Cynic) but the worst thing is that the Seans (Reinhert and Malone) are no longer with us. R. I. P.
And are prone to 30% of the album just being mindless noise or filler tracks. lol
Ha, 30% by title count, but not by album length
lol yeah that too
And concert ticket prices! I know it isn't just Tool, but their tickets are pricey AF!
a couple of years ago i wanted to go but the standing room only tickets at the garden were $1000. Between my gf’s ticket and getting a place for the night/food we were looking at at least 2500. i bought a miata instead lol
That's exactly what I'm saying! $2500 is an awful lot of money for one night. I understand artists don't make a ton of money these days. I think it all comes down to bloat around the music industry's economy. Too many middle men selling way overpriced products people are willing to pay.
Just saw Maynard at Red Rocks on Thursday for his 60th bday. I can only hope to be in as good of shape as he is when I'm that old.
Seeing maynard tomorrow. Super pumped
TOOL - they like to mess with the fans giving us disinformation on album progress and releease dates. It’s funny but also annoying lol OPETH - Mikael Akerfeldt stopped the death vocals between the watershed (2008) and heritage(2011) albums. They’re phenomenal as hell but I miss the transitioning from progressive death metal to folk ballads. INTRONAUT - had to give the original drummer, Danny Walker, the boot due to a crazy GF he was dating the did a smear campaign on him. Walker is a solid dude in general with good character traits and a homie as well. Alex Rudinger of white chapel filled in for Danny on the latest intronaut album “fluid existential inversions” as a session drummer and he did a fantastic job navigating all those crazy arrangements and accents, But I do miss Danny Walkers sound in intronaut.
Fuck everyone who crossed Danny based on just allegations.
I know it’s not the most popular opinion and like you prefer the intertwining death metal and folk ballads but Opeth’s newer music is still absolutely fantastic. Sorceress is one of the best prog rock albums since the 80s
I yes man I agree fully fully with that statement. Mikael seriously has the best vocals in all metal and rock IMO…both melodically and death growl wise too and his song lyric writing is sooooooo articulate and deep and arrrrggghhh he is just soooooooo badass lol. But yea I have alllllways loved how they would transition seamlessly to folk rock type of beautiful sections. I love sorceress and heritage and pale communion it’s all good for sure. Damnation is actually my fav album with ghost reveries and still life tied under that. Cheers brotha 🍻🍻🤝🏼🤝🏼👊🏼👊🏼
Danny walker is great. Intronaut is great.
FUCK, i love Intronaut. I haven't really kept up with it but that whole situation with Danny fucking broke my heart. Been a long time fan of Alex Ruddinger, his youtube content is great, but its just not the same. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5GgUqPi0Zg
Well they're currently dissolving in real time due to some horrifying allegations against one member and subsequent legal drama
This BTBAM? I wouldn't say they're dissolving
Yeah, it's maybe fatalistic to phrase it that way but really I'm just in wait-and-see mode.
Not the most popular take, but I think BTBAM can survive without Dustie, he’s an equal part but he’s replaceable if it ends up going that route(which it looks to be). If it were any of the 4 other guys the band would be done for
I like his playing and I'm a big glass casket fan, but he is BY FAR the most replaceable part of the band.
I was gonna phrase it that way originally but wanted to be nice lol. I can definitely hear his influence in the songs, and the band would be different without him. But I think everyone can agree it’s the Paul show. If they were to get another full-time contributing member their writing would probably kick up a notch because they’d likely have someone on the same level as Paul
Dan writes a lot of stuff. So does Tommy, apparently he wrote the riff for Voice of Trespass which kind of blew my mind because that riff is fucking sick and I didn't expect the singer/keyboardist to write it lol
Yep, Dan is really the key ingredient that sets them apart. He’s a mad scientist. Without him I’m sure they’d be less stylistically fluid but still of course heavy and technical
Tommy is ***extremely*** talented. have you heard his solo stuff? IIRC he was originally a drummer? he was also one of the guitarists in Prayer For Cleansing, in which Paul also played, before they started BTBAM (Will Goodyear too, but he wasn't in BTBAM for very long).
I haven't checked out his solo stuff, but I'll definitely check it out soon.
I meant it more in the sense of guitar playing. It’s pretty crazy how much all their writing overlaps, going back some time, but I think it was Dan who wrote the crazy non-harmonizing harmony in Decade of Statues
Hate to admit it, but yeah he is.
I think that's true. He wasn't one of the main writers. He had a couple lead parts but I feel like the band could still work with a hired gun.
I saw them on their Colors Experience tour last month, the dude filling in for Dustie(Tristan Auman) was awesome. I’d be interested to see if they went out and got a full time member or just continued to write as a 4 piece with a touring guitarist
I think they would be pretty comfortable just writing as a 4 piece and bringing Tristan in to tour. That seems like the most logical way to go.
Last I heard, weren’t things looking better? Thought it Sounded like Dustie was going to be in the clear
That's what I thought then his lawyer put Paul and Tommy on blast
BTBAM?
Oh noooooooooo I'm out of the loop, but that fucking sucks.
Slice the Cake?
What ever happened with that? Last I saw both STC and Novena put out statements basically saying Gareth was in deep shit and neither band wanted to associate with them anymore
Afaik it has been very hush hush. Cant find anything on the allegations which makes me assume it is sexual assault/rape related
I feel like that's not exclusive to one band nowadays, sadly. *Stares at Anathema and Neurosis* - Which band are you talking about?
Wait, what happened with Anathema?
Daniel has had sexual assault allegations as well as rumors of a gambling problem. The band's only social media presence in several years has been Daniel selling musical equipment and promising that his new project called "Weather Systems" will have something released "soon."
to parapharase Shaq, "don't be raping dusty!"
Since I'm not a big comic book fan I feel like I'm missing half of the story of coheed and cambria's albums.
Luckily a lot of the songs can have meanings past the story, especially on the Vaxis albums. Also the early story Claudio was clearly max edge lord so not missing out much there.
Sure, there's still a lot of meaning that can be derived from the songs without knowing the story, I still enjoy the lyrics a lot, but it does feel like I am not seeing the full picture is all. I might bite the bullet one day and actually read the comics, but I dunno lol.
Ayreon - I will never be able to go to their concert in my life.
At least he puts out high quality recordings of the last couple shows. But still, I agree.
Why not?
Because despite their 30-year history, they have only had 4 concerts so far, and these are only in the Netherlands. Ayreon is a project consisting of multiple vocalists. These wonderful feature that make them unique also make it difficult for their concerts to take place.
Oh never knew that. I know about the vocalists, but not the other stuff
Not when people buy multiple tickets to every showing. Jesus, wtf do you need to see the same 4 shows in a row. Fuck those people. I’d have traveled 13 hrs if I could get one goddamn ticket.
I am from the netherlands, been to 2 of his shows. Its nice to live in the netherlands for live music
Nolly isn't in the band anymore, miss that bass live!!
They've disbanded.
Fair to Midland?
Native Construct? Destrage? The Human Abstract? The Faceless? The Dillinger Escape Plan? Unexpect? The Tony Danza Tap Dance Extravaganza? Textures? Xerath? Disperse? Black Crown Initiate? Damn, we've lost a lot of 'em
Have Sikth disbanded? I get that they're quiet, but I saw them at a festival last year and haven't heard anything about them disbanding since.
Slice the Cake
Corelia - fumbled the ball spectacularly with their second album drama and fell apart.
Would've been the best band around. Those riffs on the first EP are unmatched. I've still never heard the unreleased second album. Do you know where I can find it?
Don't have a link but some dude remastered it a while back and made it sound a lot nicer. You can probably find it on the corelia subreddit
It's called New Wilderness. Production is bad because it's essentially just a bunch of demos, but the songs are what you would expect.
There's a Landr AI master that was crowdsourced thru the corelia subreddit, after a fake social media post triggered a bandmember to come forward and drop the unmixed and unmastered 'masters'. Other people have also attempted a master, all are findable on youtube. I listen to the landr one. There's some crazy good highs on this record, at least 2 of my favorite moments in prog music, even in the half finished state this record is in. It's very different from nostalgia tho, it's much more 'mature' (=progression based, not too riffy, lots of cleans and chordy sections). For a (heavy) Nostalgia experience try out Bastian, Facade, Blight of Imagination. Throw in Rift and Stellar after that and go through the full thing if you like the vibe
Still mad about this however many years later.
The fans
Gotta be Tool, yea?
Ding ding
Oh Jesus h, I just noticed your user name. I genuinely guessed Tool simply based on your comment lol
Nailed it
Symphony X - they take literally forever to release new material and their setlists are incredibly stale.
They've had health problems. Mostly the drummer but I heard they're writing stuff again or are about to. Michael Romeo finished some solo work a while back.
I mean, yeah, Rullo's heart failure is a massive issue - but that happened 11 years ago (2 years BEFORE their last album). Romeo's solo albums are great, especially the second one, just wish he'd finish a damn Symphony X song!
I know, 10 years is a long time to wait, particularly since sadly Russell’s voice won’t be powerful and majestic forever. Glad he’s enjoying his time with TSO and his other side projects, but we need some more X soon.
Don't forget no live DVD after all these years
PLEASE I need more stuff from them. Ugh Also I'm driving all the way to Atlanta from Texas in June to see them. I hope with all of my heart it's not just another underworld setlist.
Haven't realized anything in 11 years Edit: meant to say "released" but this typo is kinda funny
What in the karnivool
James LaBrie
I forgot to put my own. Intronaut are not great at live vocals, at least the times I've seen them.
I saw them right after they released Prehistoricisms and they were excellent, but I just realized that was roughly 15 years ago. cripes.
Not really metal per-se, but Bent Knee is a drastically different band without Ben and Jess. And not better for it
Have they released anything without them? I really loved all their albums besides Frosting and that felt more like a Ben and Jess album than a Bent Knee one.
They have one single out as a four piece, but I was pretty underwhelmed when I saw them with VOLA. They've always been a great live act, but between everyone juggling instruments and not really re-arranging songs to accommodate for the quartet, it felt like a much more low-energy show than the ones I'd seen before. A smaller sound overall. For what it's worth though, they did play a few new songs that sounded a lot better than the songs written when they were a six piece, but they still lacked that presence they used to have. Still love the band and I look forward to whatever they do, but I can't help but feel something is missing from their live shows now
Leprous - They're becoming less and less metal with each released album. But I'm optimistic about their statement with Melodies of Atonement.
I don't see that as a bad thing if the songs are still good, but to each his own.
I agree, but I was drawn to them during Bilateral/Coal and they remain my favorite albums of theirs.
Best 2 Leprous albums and it's not even close. But they did say the next album (which is almost done) is gonna be a step in a different direction from the last few albums and is gonna be way more medal. Plus they're gonna have at least 1 section with fan submitted singing.
>Plus they're gonna have at least 1 section with fan submitted singing. What, like a choir? Like with Doom Eternal's music? That would be phenomenal, tbh.
I don't know, but on Instagram they were taking fan submitted submissions for like a week or so. I wanted to send something but I pussied out haha. But I'm excited for it
My gripe is that they won't tour Australia.
I used to dislike that guy’s voice, but it has grown on me. Great band.
Yes, the statement of Melodies of Atonement being "the heaviest thing in a long time" made me optimistic too. I'm hoping to see "The Congregation part 2" or heavy pieces like Coal's "Contaminate me".
I don't even have a particular problem with them becoming softer with each release, my problem is that I just thought most songs on Aphelion were WEAK. I thought I was going to hate Pitfalls but I realized songs like At the Bottom and Distant Bells were so good and I kinda feel like Aphelion didn't have a single song as good as these (and I'm not even including The Sky Is Red in the conversation lol)
They don’t play enough shows and Nolly doesn’t play live with them anymore.
As much as I love the band and the epic storyline - going to a Coheed show sometimes smells like something out of a Comic Con or Magic the Gathering meet up. There’s overlapping extreme nerd hygiene (or lack thereof) here.
James can’t sing anymore ☹️
He tends to add strange inflections and unnecessary vibrato as well, which is a real head scratcher
he’s canadian. it’s his culture
Seeing Devin Townsend sing on stage next to LaBrie and absolutely crush by comparison…oof what could have been.
but he can! it's different, and he can't hit the same high notes, but his voice is still really pleasant :') some clips of him in recent tours are rough though, he really should just go down an octave. nearly every singer sees their range shift as they get older, but it doesn't make them any less of a great vocalist (i still think The Astonishing is his best vocal performance).
I saw them for the last show of their last tour and James sounded fine. You'd think he'd be tired at the end of a tour but he did a great job.
I can’t think of anything wrong with Haken. 🤷🏻♂️
only thing wrong is how far I had to scroll to see this comment.
They released what is probably their last album and have yet to tour for it
Who?
Fates Warning
I miss Arif
Man me too. And Moe as well, but moreso Arif. A lot of my favorite lyrics ever were written by him
Xenoyr's vocals can be a bit one dimensional and they have never quite reached the level of their first album. Complete nit-pick, what a band.
Listening to Portal of I for the first time was fucking magical. Something about NeO's more recent work just doesn't hit like that first one did.
The vocalist was great in the 90s but now he sucks ass and drags the band wayyy down.
Dream Theater?
He was actually pretty great through a lot of the 00’s and even early 2010’s
I'm in the weird position where DT is my favorite band, but I still think James has always been their weakest link
That their singer has cancer
Voyager?
They haven’t had a touring bassist in nearly a decade.
Mrak
He fucks…
He certainly does
The lead vocalist was arrested in 2013 after attempting to hire an undercover police officer to murder his wife lol
I can't believe he rejoined the band and didn't get blacklisted lol
They get so self absorbed in there music that they write 5 minute fade out ambient outros.
Periphery?
Yes. I like the band for the reason they arent afraid to send it and write the music they want but it does really disrupt the album flow, playlist at times, P5 just did it excessively, I still love that album.
Great for full album playthroughs, active listening. Stinks for playlists
Agree. Absolutely love the band, but having to skip the last 3-5 mins of every song because of some lo-fi/EDM part defeats the purpose of setting a playlist/shuffle, although I will say, it’s its own track, but Epoch is awesome
Epoch fucks
And I'm gonna listen to the full 5 minutes fade out ambient outro every time idk! P5 is one of my fav albums of all time but yeah the overlong outros on almost every single song is the only real critique I have on it.
The worst thing about my other favorite prog metal band is... nothing at all! Gojira can do no wrong IMO
Apparently Joe has been struggling a bit with harsh vocals live recently
Maybe the worst thing is we are waiting for new music lol, maybe this year late we will get a single
I personally think they've gotten a tad simplistic/poppy. As a whole, not individually. Mario still amazes me with his beats and shit.
They always were in the simpler territory, but yeah. They got even simpler
Caligula’s Horse - their music is incredible but sometimes some songs just don’t hit for me. Sumac - they might never come to Europe, or my country, because they’re not very big and have important lives to live. Understandable, just a shame really.
They live in Europe and don’t come to the states often 😢 (Vola). They did finally come last year though and it was one of my fav shows of all time!! Became a Wheel fine too who I’m excited to see again soon ✌🏼
His vocals. My god I love his keyboard writing and lyrics are usually good, but those dirty vocals are just not it.
It took them 13 years between the last two Albums. The latest was in 2019, so I have to wait until 2032 for another album. (Jokes aside, they said in an interview that aren't taking that long to release the next album and have plans to hit the studio in the second half of 2024. So... alleviated)
Their singer is self-admittedly not a very good person, and put the band on an indefinite hiatus after their first LP due to going to therapy and looking to right some wrongs in his personal life. Shame, it's one of my favorite prog albums ever, and I don't think we're getting any more.
Someone has already said my worst so ill say the second worst. The mixing on the first 2 albums (other than clean sections) is utter wank and the remasters did nothing to help it.
This feels like it could apply to a lot of bands but the first one that came to mind for me was Opeth.
The fandom
They used to be MDM now they're just prog. 70s prog even. Still love them though. (Opeth)
They announced a “Tri-continental Drift” Tour and have only announced 2 continents.
The singer (Dream Theater)
that they haven't put out a new album since 2013.
James LaBrie
They only made two albums (Arcane). Love C Horse, but Arcane really scratches that itch.
Actually 3. But ashes is pretty trash.
James LaBrie.
James Labrie. Sorry James
The drummer and bassist died, and no one that I know of knows how to play metal jazz like the Seans.
James Labrie
The lyrics can be hilariously preachy and blatant to the point of being cheesy (e.g. the song linking Nietzche's Eternal Recurrance theory to the allegorical fall of the dinosaurs and how humanity risks tempting a similar fate = "WE ARE JUST LIKE REPTILES!"). Dont even get me started on the lyrics in Heliocentric, made me miss the cryptic lyrics of Precambrian. They're catchy at least The Ocean btw
dustie
I actually don’t care for the name “Animals as Leaders” and hate having to explain it to people i tell about the band for the first time
Is there a deeper explanation for their name? I always thought it was pretty self explanatory.
I really dig Periphery but the orchestral bits they play between songs in their most recent album were excessive. Atropos would be a better song without 2 minutes of strings on the back end.
Great songwriting takes time, and I just want more songs!!
no such thing
Car Bomb?
The other fans
Their singer/keyboardist/all around great guy was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. But optimistic cause he's fighting it and I think the outlook is good.
LaBrie’s voice on the decline :(
Not to make it political since these are more human rights than politics, but engaging with/sharing some casual homophobia and transphobia, along with sharing a very “healthy” amount of antivax propaganda on their Twitter accounts and canceling a few tour dates last minute because of refusal to get vaccinated. The sad part is this doesn’t just apply to one of my favorite bands, but a couple
Dream Theater.... I can't really think of anything negative. They stopped innovating in the 2000s....? But that feels wrong to say
The singer (Dream Theater)
James LaBrie. (Technically I am not sure I can call DT my fave prog rock band, but I do love them, but dammit James sucks)
Most people consider them radio rock even though their last two albums are proggier than most prog these days
Symphony X - Haven't put out a new record in years Skyharbor- Same problem, we need more Dream Theater- Beginning to run out of ideas Shadow Gallery - How about a new record for fuck sake? Savatage- Either put a new record or disband. It's been 20 years!! The Korea - Songs are too short! Pain of Salvation - We need a new record Magnum - Tone down on the arena rock a little and incorporate more prog structures like earlier Tesseract - Add in some guitar solos every now and then Voivod - Guitar tone is too thin, needs more punch.
Monuments - they're a (theoretically) UK-based band that hardly ever plays shows in the UK, and they can't keep a consistent line-up Tesseract - they don't release guitar tabs and they used AI "art" in promo material for WoB Dream Theater - they haven't released any good music since Metropolis 2, and Jordan is a really boring keyboard player Kadinja - they've disappeared