When someone talks about concept albums in metal, Dream Theater’s ‘Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory’ is bound to come up; mainly because it was a landmark album that was universally admired both for its themes and musicianship. Dream Theater haven’t done a full concept album since then; they’ve done concept songs, but haven’t really dedicated a whole album to it. Seventeen years after ‘…Scenes from a Memory’, they have decided to create another concept album. ‘The Astonishing’ (Click Here To Read Our Review) is the result of more than two years of work by John Petrucci and the band, and they have come extremely close to topping ‘Scenes from a Memory’, by taking you out of this world and into their fantastical land to tell you a tale of struggle, love, despair and hope.
Gearing up for the release of ‘The Astonishing’, Metal Wani’s Editor In Chief Owais ‘Vitek’ Nabi had a chat with the Wizard aka Jordan Rudess. The Interview is divided into 2 Parts. In Part 1, Jordan discusses the songwriting process of ‘The Astonishing’, how accomplished the band feels by releasing the most challenging album of their career, challenges they faced to transform the futuristic idea into 2 hour 10 minutes long music. Jordan also discusses whether it’s fair for DT fans to compare ‘Scenes from a memory’ to ‘The Astonishing’ and which was very difficult to execute & implement. Jordan also throws light on why they preferred to write an album on a grand scale rather than releasing just another technical album.
Stream The Part 1 Here:
In Part 2, Jordan Rudess discusses how James LaBrie took the responsibility of 8 characters of the story and worked hard on his voice to deliver the performance of his life, ideas Mike Mangini brought to the album and how involved he was on the album as compared to self titled album released in 2013 and the upcoming tour with new stage setup and new production team. Jordan also throws light on current progressive metal scene and how the genre is loaded with bands playing without any emotion.
Stream The Part 2 Here:
