Over the years I would weave in and out of my Dream Theater fandom.\u00a0 Sometime after Scenes From a Memory, Dream Theater just seemed to lose me a bit.\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t crazy about the lyrical content and I also wasn\u2019t so excited to see that drummer Mike Portnoy was taking the wheel and steering the band into a direction even further from where I was willing to go.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t until 2009\u2019s Black Clouds and Silver Linings that I started to reconnect with Dream Theater.\u00a0 I felt like this album was somewhat of a return to form and the covers made it a fun album.\u00a0 Fast forward to Dream Theater once Mike Portnoy left.\u00a0 2011\u2019s A Dramatic Turn of Events was quite the comeback album featuring new drummer Mike Mangini but as good as it was, it sounded very mechanical and almost kind of stiff.\u00a0 I hung in there and hoped that the band would find it\u2019s footing and that they did with 2019\u2019s Distance Over Time.<\/p>\n
Kicking off with \u201cUntethered Angel,\u201d right away I felt a huge smile take over my face.\u00a0 This is Dream Theater.\u00a0 Once I got to the fourth song, \u201cBarstool Warrior,\u201d I was gleaming.\u00a0 This is the Dream Theater I loved so much.\u00a0 It was accessible, it wasn\u2019t overly self-indulgent and it was just a great song.<\/p>\n
The show stopper of Distance Over Time was hands down the song, \u201cAt Wit\u2019s End.\u201d\u00a0 This is where I feel like it all came together.\u00a0 \u201cAt Wit\u2019s End\u201d is where Dream Theater shows us that they have found their footing and that they aren\u2019t a well-oiled machine because there\u2019s nothing mechanical about this lineup.\u00a0 There are so many dynamics to this song but at the same time, there is a sense of looseness and swing thanks to drummer Mike Mangini.<\/p>\n