PLEASE do A Change of Seasons, it's remarkable

John Petrucci, the guitarist, meets a fan while they're touring in Tuscany. The fan introduces himself as the local Count and asks John if he wants to come visit his grounds. During the ride there, the Count explains a fun fact. The character of Hannibal Lecter as seen in Hannibal is loosely based on his brother, Sebastiano. The count introduces them, shows John his wine cellars and tells him another fun fact or two. The ones about the soldiers who hid in wine barrels only to be hammered shut and never released and the one about what happened in the chapel.

John is legitimately freaked out that he trusted the wrong guy and he'll end up like the soldiers or worse. He asks the Count about it and gets the answer you heard at the end of the song. The Count didn't mean to frighten him. He just wanted someone he admires to remember him and know his colorful story. He lets Petrucci go and years later, John writes the song about him.

Not sure how much of the story is fiction and how much is true, but it still makes for one hell of a story.

Many songs on Black Clouds and Silver Linings are based on dark experiences from Petruccis life. The stories are the black clouds and the resulting songs are the silver linings.

Saying that Dream Theater sounds like "a soundtrack to a fever dream" is definitely the best description of their music I've ever heard

It's always fun to hear somebody ask "is that the end"

"In The Presence Of Enemies, PT. 1" followed by PT. 2 is also quite a journey 🙂

I believe the reason for the calm outro sounds are because the song ends on a positive note, as does the album. Whereas the first song of the album, Nightmare to Remember starts with thunderstorm sounds and that song has a dark, scary feel.

You gotta listen to A Nightmare to remember

For a “SHORT” Dream Theater song, let me suggest “Wait for sleep” from the album “Images and Words” easy peasy... 02:31 min, but quite beautiful 👍

Funny how you felt that the verse had a very "early Metallica" vibe. The guitarist John Petrucci has said in one of his instructional videos that with the chugging low notes the verse was directly influenced by Metallica's playing style, especially songs like Creeping Death and Master of Puppets.

The slow atmospheric section, Jordan (the keyboardist) is playing the slow synth pad strings and then John (the guitarist) is playing the lead tone there.  He's using a volume swell pedal to create that effect.  If that's the part you were referring to..?

Great reaction.  When you're ready, Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes From A Memory in it's entirety.  Listening to the full album is how it should be done.  For me, it's the greatest album ever made.  Hope you do more Dream Theater reactions.  On DT's most recent release, Distance Over Time, all tracks are under 10 mins and it's another great work from these phenomenal musicians.  Peace.

A change of seasons, you are going to be blown away

Hey, My suggestions for the upcoming reactions i. Your dream THEATER Journey:
A CHANGE OF SEASONS
THE SHATTERED FORTRESS
THE DANCE OF ETERNITY
A NIGHTMARE TO REMEMBER

The story of the song is a literal anecdote, the guitarist and his guitar tech actually went to an Italian Count's mansion and drank wine, and while they were amazed by the grandeur of it all, they were also creeped out by the Dracula/Hannibal vibes (because one of the characters, "the brother" is a real guy, who was in the movie Hannibal and was a source for the film).

From the FanWiki:
"The count is: Count Niccolò Capponi. He is a bearded, historian count who lives in the Tuscany area, and whose family is in the wine business.
He was a source of information for the Thomas Harris film "Hannibal", and is mentioned in the book. He also makes an appearance in the movie as one of the panel members for Dr. Fell's (Lecter's) selection as curator of the CAPPONI Library.""

"Black Clouds & Silver Linings" was the first DT album i ever listened to, and this song will always be one my favorite songs from this band.

This is my favorite Dream Theater song, cause it has everything all packed into one.

This song came out in 2009. They have an epic (15+ min) on probably every other album out of their 14 albums. Dream theater are known for their intros and outros. Not many bands do them as often or as well as they do.

Some of their earlier albums they were "forced" to make more mainstream sounding songs by the record companies in an attempt to make them more accessible.

While I'll hop on the "change of seasons"/"breaking all illusions" bandwagon for the next epic, a good dark horse suggestion for you would be "Scarred". A very different sound of dream theater than anything you've really heard so far.

"A very contained honed insanity", pretty much what they're all about, they even named an album after this idea...Systematic Chaos.

I think you would love  illumination theory, change of seasons, or stream of consciousness

I think you should really take a look at "Breaking all Illusions", "The Ministry of Lost Souls" or "Illumination Theory". Apart from that...Ayreon is a great band/collective to check out....I really like "The Fifth Extinction" for e.g.