Music of the Day, 12 February 2024
this stream of life flows on
It isn’t often that I try to structure my day. I usually have a few goals but am not fussy about when I work on them, because invariably when I do set arbitrary timelines, they go awry.
Thus, when I set a loose timetable last night for accomplishing some things this morning, I also wondered what would upend it and when. I could never have known that it would be a completely unexpected and happy surprise: a reunion with a very dear friend (S) via a mutual friend, P.1 For years, we’d shared our deep interests in music and philosophy via online correspondence.2 Then we drifted apart—I think unintentionally for each of us. One of the first topics of conversation when P and I reestablished contact was whether we’d heard from S; neither of us had. We both held out hope, but it grew fainter with time.
Until this weekend. S called P and after the call ended, P emailed me with the great news and then emailed us both so we could reconnect directly. As I composed a note to S this morning immediately after reading P’s email, today’s MotD began to play in my mind.
“Lifting Shadows off a Dream” is from Dream Theater’s 1994 album, Awake. It dropped into my life at a tumultuous time, and many of its songs have had shifting meanings and connections for me through it and beyond. Today, the title alone has developed new ones centered on S.
I’d forgotten how much I adore this luscious song, starting with John Myung’s bass intro and his evocative lyrics. As the music swells, so do James LaBrie’s beautiful vocals, moving from a tender head voice to his powerful chest voice. And those complex vocal harmonies at the close! They reverberate throughout my body every time.
Like the other Dream Theater song featured here last August, “Lifting Shadows” is on the lighter side of their prog-metal sound, especially compared to their later releases.3 That’s purely coincidence, as their meatier sound is what drew me in initially and keeps my Dream Theater library on my laptop for easy access. Once I’ve gotten a couple of items checked off my list, I’ll be cranking the underappreciated4 Falling Into Infinity, from 1997. If you’d like to explore DT’s heavier side from that album, “Burning My Soul” and the snarky “Just Let Me Breathe” are good places to start.
To be clear, both are very dear to me; I just didn’t want to be repetitious here
Blogs, forum posts, and email
So I’m led to believe; I don’t own anything after their 2002 release, Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence
By other DT fans, not by me!