Dream Theater has released their tenth studio album, and it really is one hell of an album. Twenty years after the release of their first album, this one seems to take themes from past albums and put them on this album. There are songs on here that belong on “Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence,” “A Change of Seasons,” “Images and Words,” and even “Octavarium.” There are six tracks on the album, with two-thirds of the tracks being longer than ten minutes. However, these tracks are all masterpieces, with their own themes and emotions intertwined in each riff and lyric. Which is appropriate because five out of the six tracks involve personal experiences involving difficult or disturbing moments in the members’ livesThe opening track, “A Nightmare To Remember”, starts off very ominously with raindrops and haunting piano playing in the background before kicking in and deafening us with thundering drums and guitars, then finally settling into one of Dream Theater’s signature complicated riffs, which seems to be taken straight from the album “Awake.” This song is about a car crash guitarist John Petrucci was in. It is very haunting, especially when you hear a car crash, ambulance, and medical equipment in the background. Most of these songs are sad and emotionally moving, but none are as powerful as “The Best of Times” which drummer Mike Portnoy wrote to his father who died of cancer shortly before the album’s release. Portnoy’s father did hear this song before his death, which was a tribute to the life he had with his son. It is a very somber song with violins and piano as the major instruments until the guitar kicks in with an amazing solo. It helps us realize that we should be happy for all our memories, it shows us what a truly diverse band like Dream Theater can do. However, the highlight track of this entire album is not the single, “A Right of Passage”, which is a song about freemasonry, but the conclusion to Portney’s “Twelve-step Suite.”A series of twelve songs spanning four albums, totaling 57 minutes, with each song about a different step in alcoholism rehab, which Portnoy went through. “The Shattered Fortress” comprises elements of the other songs in the suite, including riffs and lyrics, yet he still finds a way to make it a unique song. This is the song that ties all the other songs together, even ending with the static from the first song of the suite, “The Glass Prison”, ending the suite the same way it began. All in all, this is one hell of an album. It’s one of the best so far in 2009, and one of the best Dream Theater albums released. This is one you should buy, especially when you can get a three-disc edition with instrumentals of all the tracks as well as covers. It is an absolute masterpiece.