Dream Theater sign with Roadrunner Records! "Systematic Chaos" due 07/06/2007!!!

[bluepony]

Hail bluepony.     

Thanks, Maddox! 

[Nicky007]

Quite fun, especially for you, Paco (from Wikipedia, on Octavarium):


Many fans have made observations about the recurrances of 5s and 8s in the album art, possibly a reference to the Golden ratio, very common in art throughout history and in Nature itself. The name Octavarium itself has 5 syllables, while connotating 8. The use of 5s and 8s stems from the number of natural notes (white keys on a piano) and black keys (sharp/flat notes) in an octave. It may also refer to the number of members in the band from its inception in 1985 to 2005, Octavarium being the band's 8th studio album, and the subsequent "Score" being their fifth live album.

Several of the 5 and 8 references in the album are:

1.   This is their 8th album and they have released 5 live DVDs.
2.   The cover and back cover show a Newton's Cradle with eight pendulums, and five birds in between them, arranged in the same pattern as black piano keys. (The black birds represent flats and sharps and the balls of the pendulum represent the natural notes.)
3.   On the spine of the album there are piano keys in an octave.
4.   On the page 5 of the booklet, there are two dominoes summing up to 5 and 8.
5.   On the page 7 of the booklet, there is a spider (which has eight legs) trapped inside an octagon-shaped maze. The maze is made of five layers and has eight doorways amongst the layers, and eight walls that form "dead ends".
6.   On the page 11 of the booklet, there is an octopus (which has eight legs), five fish and an octagonal stop sign.
7.   On the page 13 of the booklet, there is a plant in which a five-pointed star was drawn inside an octagon. The scale of the plant is stated to be 5:8.
8.   On the insides of the the front and back covers of the booklet, there are two pictures of the same boy holding two ends of a can telephone. First picture is accompanied by 8 lines of capitalized text (track titles). Second picture is accompanied by 5 lines (band members' names).
9.   The boy has 5 fingers showing in one picture, and the other picture only has 3 fingers showing.. adds up to eight.
10.  The booklet itself has eight pages, if left and right pages are considered to be a single page.
11.  On the inlay of the album, there is a billiards eight-ball.
12.  The title track (Octavarium) comprises five movements.

Also, the star in the octagon has musical keys written around it that go in a circle of fifths.

The Newton's Cradle on the cover and the musical hooks connecting all the songs together lyrically and melodically have also given rise to the theory that the entire album is intended to be a concept album portraying continuity.


Nicky.

[PH]

Yeah, I know most of that already and thought it was quite interesting!
Thanks anyway.


-Paco