Dream Theater

I like the album and Hollow years and take away my pain are my favs.

It is certainly an underrated album. Much better than Octavarium and Systematic Chaos in my opinion, but not as good as ADTOE.

It's a very good album, yet sadly so underrated. It contains some of my favorite Dream Theater songs, like Trial of Tears and Take Away My Pain. Trial of Tears especially is one of the best songs ever, because it has such an expressive lyrics and an awesome bass line. That song, in my opinion, is John Myung's masterwork.

Compromised by the label, but still in the upper half of the DT catalog, imo. Trial of Tears is one of their best epics ever. Also a big fan of other songs mentioned already: Peruvian Skies, Hell's Kitchen, Lines in the Sand and Take Away My Pain, in particular :)

It's actually a pretty good album... Trail of Tears and Hollow Years (haha that rhymed) are my favorite tracks. I would still say its DT's weakest album though, right behind ADTOE, that's not really saying anything though when you consider that they have never made a bad album.

It's an incredible record if you keep in mind what was going on at the time. I believe it is their attempt to be a more "commercial" band due to pressure from their record label and the industry in general. This was before the digital music revolution and for rock bands to succeed at the time, they had to have a radio or MTV hit. "Pull Me Under" had been a surprise rock radio hit, and they were under heavy pressure to deliver another hit. So they tried to compress the DT sound into shorter, more radio friendly songs and sound (starting with the "Awake" record.) . I think they accomplished that and more on FII while staying true to themselves. I don't think any other band from that era except maybe Rush was able to achieve that as well as DT did. Lucky for us they can do whatever they want now.

It's not that bad of an album in my opinion, I do believe that it is DT's weakest album, but i still enjoy listening to it :)

I like all the songs except "You Not Me", "Just Let Me Breath" and "Burning My Soul". "You Not Me" and Burning My Soul" were better on the demo tracks and I probably would have liked them if they had been recorded they way they were originally intended. I personally think that "Hell's Kitchen" should have been left inside of "Burning My Soul". And the subject matter of "Just Let Me Breath" just doesn't interest me that much.

My favorite songs would be "New Millennium", "Peruvian Skies" and "Trial of Tears". When I heard the intro to "New Millennium" for the first time I was out jogging and suddenly it was as if all the mountains around me turned into polygon shapes. I was so overwhelmed by the experience that I fell down onto my knees and cried.

I know that sounds a little dramatic, but that was my experience none the less.
"

It's a good record, but it would be a great record if it had looked like this:

New Millennium
You OR Me
Peruvian Skies
Hollow Years
Raise the Knife
Hell's Kitchen
Speak to Me
Lines in the Sand
Take Away my Pain ("slower" version)
Trial of Tears
"Hidden" track---Eve