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I have been a DT fan since the 80's and I have not always been enthusiastic about their work. For me things started sounding stale around Infinity and Six degrees. Then they changed, and have been progressively improving (pun intended) since Train of Thought. I really see Black Clouds as a breakthrough album for DT. This is different, and in my opinion, better than almost everything that has come before. It's more progressive without losing any of the hard edge. Long epic songs that are theme based but with abundant variety so that you are never even momentarily bored. Just when you think 'wow, this is a great theme' it changes to another great theme. It is almost as if each song is 5-6 good songs tied together. The only song on the album that gets repetitive is The Best of Times, which is still a very good song. We get growling from DT for the first time ever - not LaBrie but Portnoy - and as someone who generally does not like growling, this plays out very well. I will say that for the first time since he joined the band, I actually like LaBrie's vocals. He has really come a long way and seems to integrate well into the rest of the music - something which I don't think he did well in the first few albums. I think the pinnacle of his career with DT is the 'Beautiful Agony' section of Nightmare. Gives me goosebumps every time. Portnoy, Myung and JP are technically incredible, as always, although I liked JP's tone on Systematic Chaos a little better. Rudess does a lot of synth-noise stuff on this album which I am not convinced takes any actual skill and seems like filler. I kind of wish he would spend a little more time composing memorable solos instead of thrashing on a touch pad. Its fun but it gets old after a while.
In all, as oppoesd to almost every other band I have followed, DT seems to be getting better with age. No pop sellouts. No lazy, redundant, self indulgent music. It is fresh, crisp, hard, interesting, beautiful progressive music that I will be listening to 10, 20, 30 years from now - just as I still listen to 'Dream and Day.' What more could you ask for?
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