The Crooked Step

Dream Theater is a Progressive Metal band from New York, they are considered to be 5 of the most talented musicians in the rock world and have attained world wide accliam and respect for their excellent music. For information about the band and it's history, please read the History section.

Progressive Metal is a genre that mixes elements of Progressive Rock and Heavy Metal together. Progressive music is charactarized by longer songs, complicated arrangements and many time signature changes. It also quite often has elements of Classical or Jazz.

I'm having a hard time understanding this, what does Dream Theater sound like?

You can check out 30 second samples in the Albums section. I'd describe DT as being a mix of progrock bands like Rush, Genesis and Yes and metal bands such as Metallica, Iron Maiden and Megadeth.

Keep in mind that rarely do two progmetal bands sound alike. The band that approximates DT's sound the most is Queensryche. You should also check out Fates Warning, Opeth, Nevermore and Tool.

Any song will get boring if it sucks. Due to the uprising of pop music in recent times, most people who ask this question are used to "verse, chorus, verse" songs that are about 3 minutes long and have only one sound (maybe with a bridge). Dream Theater are progressive, therefore their songs are more complicated and don't have just one sound. To a prog fan, the 23 minute epic A Change of Seasons might actually seem a bit on the short side, as it is so brilliant that you don't want it to end, while a 3 minute pop song by Britney Spears might seem like an eternity.

No. Dream Theater's longest songs are Six Degrees of Inner Turublence which is 42 minutes long, A Change of Seasons which is 23 minutes long, and A Mind Beside Itself which is about 20 minutes long. Bands such as Gamma Ray have done songs over an hour long.

Hardly, extended rock songs dates back to the 1970's during the progressive rock boom. Some examples of longer classic rock songs are Shine on you Crazy Diamond, 2112 and Anna Gotta Da Vida by Pink Floyd, Rush and Iron Butterfly respectively.

Rush is the band's biggest influence. They have also cited Genesis, Metallica, Iron Maiden. Yes, Emerson Lake and Palmer and Queensryche.

This depends. Each of DT's albums have a very specific feel and sound that has never been duplicated by any other of their albums. If you are a progressive fan I would heartily reccomend starting with Scenes From A Memory. If you are a metal fan, I would reccomend getting Train of Thought first. If you are neither and you just want a broad sense of what DT is all about I would say to start with Images and Words.

The quick answer is no. DT is not a christian band, in the way that they do not do christian music. You may see religious or christian overtones in their music, but they do songs about pretty much everything. Jordan Rudess is devoutly Jewish, and Mike Portnoy is a non-practicing jew. John Petrucci is a catholic and the religions of the other members were never really disclosed. It is known that Charlie Dominici is a devout christian, however he is no longer in the band.

Dream Theater enjoys a lot of radio play...just not in the United States. In places like Europe, Japan and South America where Progressive music and Metal in general are extremely popular, DT also are extremely popular. In the states, DT take a backseat to numetal and pop. It's sad, but there are still a great many Dream Theater fans in their own home country. Dream Theater did enjoy a lot of success when their song Pull Me Under became a hit single and video on MTV. MTV also gave the video for Lie a lot of play.

Mike's biggest influences are Neal Peart, Frank Zappa, Lars Ulrich, Terry Bozzio and Ringo Starr. Jordan's biggest influences are the classical composers such as Beethoven and Mozart, and rock keyboardists such as Keith Emerson. John P.'s biggest influences are Steve Vai and Yngwie Malmsteen. John M's biggest influence is Geddy Lee.

Derek Sherinian has released several solo albums and continues to be a prescence in the progressive world. Kevin Moore has his own band called Chroma Key. Charlie Dominici is working on a new album, and also managed an insurance company.

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