I got my Ki copy in the mail this week. Thanks Dev for the signature!

I hope the next two albums ratchet up the variation at least a little bit, or we'll end up with 3 'good' albums, when we could have had one really incredible one. .

Yeah man, I hear ya. Instead of everything he's done so far, maybe Dev should have just waited until around 2030 A.D before he released a single album. Then that ONE album would be the most bombass thing in history, easily pussifying Mozart in terms of brilliance. That would obviously work out perfectly because in every album an artist makes, he "uses up" some of his "awesomeness" that can never be taken back. It's quantitative, right? I get it.

Your skills as a logician have impressed me immensely, and I am embarrassed that I didn't think of this myself. If I had, I would have emailed Dev back in '95 and asked him to please wait until 2030 before resuming his career. Just look at all we as fans have LOST now. *sigh* Ah well. Tomorrow is a new day.

I can really feel the emotions of 'cold turkey' in KI. Like a strange anticipation, especially the way the percussion fits into the mix.
Dig the big phat Heavens trumpets in Heavens send, and the lead at around 5.00 minute, those Shred posts make more sense now
TASTE THE CHAOS
"can we just go straight to the end?", lol, there is no end to infinity, revel in it.
Only in the middle of my 4th listen, seems like a good grower, tunes getting stuck in my head all day at work.

I hope the next two albums ratchet up the variation at least a little bit, or we'll end up with 3 'good' albums, when we could have had one really incredible one. .

Yeah man, I hear ya. Instead of everything he's done so far, maybe Dev should have just waited until around 2030 A.D before he released a single album. Then that ONE album would be the most bombass thing in history, easily pussifying Mozart in terms of brilliance. That would obviously work out perfectly because in every album an artist makes, he "uses up" some of his "awesomeness" that can never be taken back. It's quantitative, right? I get it.

Your skills as a logician have impressed me immensely, and I am embarrassed that I didn't think of this myself. If I had, I would have emailed Dev back in '95 and asked him to please wait until 2030 before resuming his career. Just look at all we as fans have LOST now. *sigh* Ah well. Tomorrow is a new day.

Sorry that you misinterpreted my post, I suppose I should have been more clear.

I was not saying by any stretch of the imagination, that artists should wait until they have a ton of good ideas, THEN put out a record, it simply doesn't work that way. But with these records, he was writing them all (unless I've read incorrectly) at roughly the same time. That worked with City and Biomech (though the middle of Biomech was boring), but it really hasn't worked since then. I've found the SYL/DTB companion records to be hands down his worst quality, whereas stuff written without two concrete ideas for the albums were my favorites (ziltoid and terria).

And Dev, I know that you aren't writing anything 'for' us, I'll still buy your records even if one is a turd on a plate. I'm just giving my honest opinion about what I've felt from Ki though =\

[The Dev]

That's cool man...

Maybe you've lost interest and it's time to stop buying them then?

Either way, peace!

I don't want to sound like a Fan Boi (with shitty spelling style) here...

BUT

Ki is fantastic...and I mean that with all sincerity (spelling?!)

It's powerful... GREAT quality music and production... it sounds so organic and "natural" if that makes sense.

Infinity/Terria and Synchestra were my favourites...but I think that's changing now

Ki is truly wonderful, Dev...thank you! You've done a steller job!

Hmm, Ki was an interesting one for me. And there's something personally that mildly bugs me about a few recent interviews.

Ocean Machine to me, hit nerves in my body that only a VERY few albums have done. The only album that I could say has done more so, is Alive or Just Breathing, Killswitch Engage's last album before Jesse Leach left.
He is perhaps one of the most righteous, honest and expressive vocalists I have ever heard. He appreciates every single fan that helps push him on and is constantly a source of inspiration for many. He absolutely sung his heart out on that record, and I heard that from Devin on Ocean Machine. If Dev reads this, I would like to thank him sincerely from the very innermost bit of me for doing that. I hope maybe I can repay him by doing that with something in my life for someone else.

Now as much as it may seem so, even based on some of the posts I've made, what I've just written there, and so on, I'm not actually someone that thinks purely in heaviness. I actually WAY prefer Devin's personal works to SYL (SYL is still amazing, just my personal preference) and I listen to a lot of music that shares little in common with it.

But what bugs me, is this "sincerity" thing that pops up. Yes, Ki is absolutely sincere and you can hear it, and I really don't want to misunderstand anything or insult, but It feels like a tiny bit of a pee-take if everything before Ki is seemingly now second rate. I like Ki, some of its absolutely beautiful, some of it is a different (but still welcome change) but I just hope it's not going down that kind of course that Linkin' Park did (not that I'm a fan or that devin compares in any manner), where they decided to say everything before their latest album was " nothing compared to our new stuff". Alot of fans were pissed - cause those albums got them somewhere, and allowed them to carry on their dream of making music.

I just hope new stuff isnt compared to how good the old stuff was, and old stuff isnt compared to how good the new stuff is.

Its just a bugbear though.

That's cool man...

Maybe you've lost interest and it's time to stop buying them then?

Either way, peace!

Fuck no. I said I didn't think Ki was a perfect album, I didn't say that I don't respect it.

It takes a certain amount of balls to pull a 180 like that, and release something completely different than you ever have, and this is your first time doing so. You stated not long ago that you wouldn't mind writing a bunch of albums just like Ki. Heavy as a Really Heavy Thing (like Ki) had flashes of brilliance, but it was the start of something new for you, which evolved into something fucking fantastic.

For a first try, yeah it's not perfect, but it's definitely got some great fucking cuts of music on it, and I still listen to it quite a bit.

[The Dev]

Gotcha!

What is a perfect record to you, and why?

Personally I think judging Ki based on a comparison to previous Devin Townsend albums, is like judging Infinity or Terria by comparing it to Strapping Young Lad.
Certainly, you might like one of them more than the other, but in my opinion they're so different that it doesn't really make much sense to compare them against each other.

I just hope it's not going down that kind of course that Linkin' Park did (not that I'm a fan or that devin compares in any manner), where they decided to say everything before their latest album was " nothing compared to our new stuff". Alot of fans were pissed - cause those albums got them somewhere, and allowed them to carry on their dream of making music.

Isn't any musician going to feel that about their latest work though? As you keep writing music, you're going to get better at it, learn from your mistakes (or what you considered to be mistakes) in your previous work. Going through that process, it's got to be hard to maintain an appreciation of your previous work, without seeing how much you've moved on since then, or thinking about you would have done this or that differently.

That said, calling Linkin Park musicians is a bit of a stretch, haha

Most orgasms in a finite period of time.



Or City.

You know what I REALLY don't get?

why everyone thinks this album is so different from other Dev stuff.

It IS different, sure. I really like it too, I sat an listened to ti three times in a row when it arrived today. But I don't see why its SO different.

Honestly.

Maybe it's because I still know it's Dev? Maybe I'm that musically diverse or something? I dunno. I don't understand why everyone takes this album to be so radically different from what he has done.

I still completely associate it with Dev, and see it as something Dev would create. Perhaps that's why?

(And as a random point, I hassled Devs twitter about this eariler, but man, the vocals from both Dev and Che are amazing, in my opinion.)

You know what I REALLY don't get?

why everyone thinks this album is so different from other Dev stuff.

It IS different, sure. I really like it too, I sat an listened to ti three times in a row when it arrived today. But I don't see why its SO different.

Honestly.

Maybe it's because I still know it's Dev? Maybe I'm that musically diverse or something? I dunno. I don't understand why everyone takes this album to be so radically different from what he has done.

I still completely associate it with Dev, and see it as something Dev would create. Perhaps that's why?

(And as a random point, I hassled Devs twitter about this eariler, but man, the vocals from both Dev and Che are amazing, in my opinion.)

I know what you mean. It's sort of "expected" that he'd do something like Ki, it's still very Devyish. But I think the thing that's different is the usage of clean guitar sound, groovy jazz drumming and what Dev's said; having little to prove anymore. Refraining from going all heavy and shit, bar the end of Ki. I am not very articulate.

I'd say the clean guitar tone and use of dynamics, the experimentation with different styles (Trainfire being a good example), and the way that the multilayered bit at the end of Ki cuts off suddenly instead of running with it, are good examples of how different it is to what has come before.

To me, it's as different from what's come before, as Alien is to Synchestra.

Oh yeah. I'm not saying it's /not/ different. It certainly is. But I just mean a general view on it seems to be like "Nothing has ever been like this ever." Or just "boring." xD I don't view it as boring at all. it's interesting in a very honest way.

Maybe that's how its different.

Maybe I'm alone on this one, but I feel like I know the album as if it's been in my collection for years already. It's a little pecuilar.