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''Images and Words'' is the second studio album by American
progressive metal Progressive metal (often shortened to prog metal) is a broad fusion music genre melding heavy metal music, heavy metal and progressive rock, combining the loud "aggression" and amplified electric guitar, guitar-driven sound of the former with t ...
band Dream Theater, released on July 7, 1992, through
Atco Records ATCO Records is an American record label founded in 1955. It is owned by Warner Music Group and operates as an imprint of Atlantic Records. After several decades of dormancy and infrequent activity under alternating Warner Music labels, the com ...
. It is the first Dream Theater release to feature James LaBrie on vocals. Since its release, the album has maintained its position as the band's most commercially successful studio album, and the song " Pull Me Under" has the distinction of being the only Top 10 hit (radio or otherwise) the band has had to date. This particular song has also had more recent success as it has appeared in the 2008 video game ''
Guitar Hero World Tour ''Guitar Hero World Tour'' is a 2008 rhythm game developed by Neversoft and published by Activision. It is the fourth main installment and the sixth overall installment in the Guitar Hero, ''Guitar Hero'' series. The game was launched in North A ...
''.


History

After Charlie Dominici's departure from Dream Theater, the band auditioned nearly 200 individuals across the nation, until James LaBrie, who at that point was part of Canadian
glam metal Glam metal (also known as hair metal or pop metal) is a subgenre of heavy metal music, heavy metal that features pop music, pop-influenced Hook (music), hooks and guitar riffs, upbeat arena rock, rock anthems, and slow Sentimental ballad#Powe ...
band Winter Rose, sent the band an audition tape. After a short jam session, he was named Dream Theater's new lead singer, and has remained with them ever since. With LaBrie as the new vocalist, the band was signed to a seven-album contract by
Atco Records ATCO Records is an American record label founded in 1955. It is owned by Warner Music Group and operates as an imprint of Atlantic Records. After several decades of dormancy and infrequent activity under alternating Warner Music labels, the com ...
, and shortly thereafter, they began recording their new album in late 1991. The album's production was marred with tensions, as the band clashed with producer David Prater, including incidents where Prater would lock the band out of the studio while infamously forcing drummer Mike Portnoy to use triggered snare and bass drum samples, with the snare sample being the exact one used on FireHouse's 1992 album ''Hold Your Fire'', another album Prater produced around the same time. The lead single, " Pull Me Under", gained the band considerable commercial success with its airplay on MTV and radio, garnering them a top 10 hit on ''
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s
Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks Mainstream Rock is a music chart published by '' Billboard'' magazine that ranks the most-played songs on mainstream rock radio stations in the United States. It is an administrative category that combines the " active rock" and " heritage rock" ...
chart. When the album was released, it sold at a steady pace, helped by an extensive world tour. Dream Theater originally intended to release a double album, but that plan was rejected by ATCO, causing several songs to be omitted from the album. One of these songs, " A Change of Seasons", would later be re-recorded by the band and released on an EP of the same name in 1995. The song " Take the Time" includes samples from
Kurtis Blow Kurtis Walker (born August 9, 1959), known professionally by his stage name Kurtis Blow, is an American rapping , rapper, songwriter, and record producer. Walker is the first commercially successful rapper and the first to sign with a major rec ...
's "Christmas Rappin'" ("Hold it now"),
Frank Zappa Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American guitarist, composer, and bandleader. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa composed Rock music, rock, Pop music, pop, jazz, jazz fusion, orchestra ...
's "
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" ("Wait a minute"), and
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's "Power to the People", ("Come on"). The song also features a quote from
Giuseppe Tornatore Giuseppe Tornatore (born 27 May 1956) is an Italian film director and screenwriter. He is considered one of the directors who brought critical acclaim back to Italian cinema.Katz, Ephraim, "Italy," ''The Film Encyclopedia'' (New York: HarperRes ...
's movie
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: "Ora che ho perso la vista, ci vedo di più" ("Now that I have lost my sight, I see more"), sung and paraphrased by LaBrie shortly before in the song ("I can see much clearer now, I'm blind"). LaBrie had appeared as a guest vocalist on Fates Warning's 1991 album '' Parallels'', for which the band was credited as "Dream Theatre" in the "special thanks" of the album's credits. Dream Theater responded by thanking "Fatez Warning" in the credits of ''Images and Words''. ''Images and Words'' was played in its entirety on several occasions during the European leg of the 2007 "Chaos in Motion" tour, in celebration of its 15th anniversary. On July 7, 2012, at a concert in
Austin, Texas Austin ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Texas. It is the county seat and most populous city of Travis County, Texas, Travis County, with portions extending into Hays County, Texas, Hays and W ...
, the songs "Pull Me Under", "Another Day", and "Metropolis" were performed as an encore to celebrate the album's 20th anniversary; additionally, "Surrounded" was performed during the main set. In 2017, Dream Theater celebrated the 25th anniversary of the album on the "Images, Words & Beyond" tour in Europe, which started on January 30 at the Auditorium Parco Della Musica in Rome, Italy. In a 2019 interview with Greg Prato in SongFacts, LaBrie listed ''Images and Words'' as the Dream Theater album he is most proud of, because "that established what Dream Theater really is. I think it's a phenomenal album from beginning to end." The album was reissued in 2013 on
vinyl Vinyl may refer to: Chemistry * Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer * Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation * Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry * Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl ...
as a limited edition 180 gram double LP.


Tour

Dream Theater kicked off a world-wide tour in support of the album, starting on September 27, 1992, in
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,
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, continued with relentless touring throughout North America and
Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...
, consisted of 97 dates across the US and Canada, one show in
Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...
, and 3 dates in Japan. A tour of
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followed in 1993, which included a show at
London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
's famed Marquee Club. The show was recorded and released as '' Live at the Marquee'', Dream Theater's first official live album. Additionally, a video compilation of their Japanese concerts (mixed in with documentary-style footage of the off-stage portion of the tour) was released as ''Images and Words: Live in Tokyo''.


Reception

The album has received acclaim from music critics since its release. The German magazine '' Rock Hard'' elected ''Images and Words'' Album of the Month and lauded Dream Theater, using "the old 970sterm ' supergroup; according to the reviewer, they set "standards and still perfect them, although they hardly appear to do so" and, even considering the many influences in their music, the "versatility, the linking of different grooves and melody elements within each songs" shows how Dream Theater are "style-transcending like no other band." In another contemporary review, '' Select'' gave the album a lower rating, referring to the album as "elaborate, layered prog-metal" and stated that "if this was a book, it'd be for the coffee-table, glossy but not essential." Phil Carter of
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was taken by the band members' "impressive ability on their respective instruments" and by LaBrie's vocal range, writing also that the album is an "excellent mix of progressive metal stylings with heartfelt vocals and thought-provoking lyrics".
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reviewer calls ''Images and Words'' "a masterpiece and also a historical album", because it "brought something totally new to the scene, this famous progressive metal sound that would become Dream Theater's signature". Canadian journalist Martin Popoff in his ''Collector's Guide to Heavy Metal'' praised the band's musicianship and "the tricky arrangements", but was not thrilled by the album, which he found "a bit too self-aware and calculated to be in the true spirit of progressive rock." ''Images and Words'' was a moderate commercial hit, reaching number 61 on the US ''Billboard'' 200 chart. It is also Dream Theater's only album to be certified gold by the
RIAA The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
, and remains their best-selling album to date, selling more than 600,000 copies.


Accolades

On April 9, 2013, ''Images and Words'' won ''
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s fan-voted March Metal Madness award for best metal album of all time. The song "Under a Glass Moon" was awarded the 98th best
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by an
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guitar expert. In October 2011, ''Images and Words'' was ranked number 7 on '' Guitar World'' magazine's top ten list of guitar albums of 1992. In 2015, the album was ranked first on the website Prog Report's list of the top 50 progressive rock albums of 1990–2015. Four other Dream Theater albums made the list: '' Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory'' (third), '' Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence'' (14th), '' Awake'' (18th), and ''
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'' (38th). In 2017, it was ranked 95th at ''
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'''s "100 Greatest Metal Albums of All Time".


Track listing


Personnel

Dream Theater * James LaBrie – lead and backing vocals * Kevin Moore – keyboards * John Myung – bass *
John Petrucci John Peter Petrucci (born July 12, 1967) is an American guitarist, best known as a founding member of the progressive metal band Dream Theater. He produced or co-produced (often with Mike Portnoy before Portnoy's absence from the band 2010-2023 ...
– guitars * Mike Portnoy – drums, percussion Additional musicians * Jay Beckenstein – soprano saxophone on "Another Day" Production *David Prater – producer, mixing *Doug Oberkircher –
engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...
, mixing *Steve Regina – assistant engineer *
Ted Jensen Ted Jensen (born September 19, 1954) is an American mastering engineer, known for having mastered many recordings, including the Eagles' '' Hotel California'', Green Day's '' American Idiot'' and Norah Jones' ''Come Away with Me''. Early life ...
mastering at Sterling Sound, New York *Larry Freemantle – art direction


Charts


Certifications


References


External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Images And Words Dream Theater albums 1992 albums Atco Records albums