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Dream Theater Breaking All Illusions Bass cover w/guitar solo on bass

261 views · Published 28 December 2016 · 12:19 · Indexed 8 October 2026

Channel: awaken1001 · 2016 · Music

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Recorded over isolated keyboard track, just bass and keys.
Original track: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tx7hHqlHLtk&ab_channel=vetkeyboardist

This song has been a work in progress and a true labour of love for me for the last four years. Took me the better part of a year just to unravel the song structurally after the album came out, and it was one of those things where one minute something doesn't make sense and the next you have an epiphany and everything falls into place. That was certainly true of the section right after the solo -struggle, struggle, strugg..."Oh, wait. Aaaaaahhh!! THAT's what's going on!"

But what captivated me about this song from the first time I heard it was John Petrucci's solo and the closing section of the song. This was one I knew I was going to have to learn and adapt to my playing style - I love playing guitar lines on bass and this was an almost tailor-made challenge for me. So I've been fiddling with arrangements off and on for a couple of years and think I've come up with something that works.

So my amp is basically on life support with a blown speaker (the thing is 40 years old and been through a lot) so the sound is muddy as fuck half the time, apologies for that. I intend to rerecord this with new gear  (amp and effects) when I get it, probably within the year, just wanted to put this up for posterity and to get some initial feedback from y'all.

Again, don't be looking for a carbon copy of John Myung, I'm a bass guitarist in the literal sense and flow in and out of the guitar and bass tracks as my sense of melody takes me. I invite you to listen with fresh ears and clear mind, and try to imagine the solo section with a proper sound: overdrive for sustain, reverb, some chorus to round things out, maybe a slight delay).

Oh, and I play it in D-standard tuning to get at the open strings, crucial (for me anyway) to being able to play this properly. I can understand that maybe the standard-E open strings are critical for the guitar, but Myung's life would be so much easier if he played it in standard D.But that's me, having learned what he wrote after Petrucci wrote his bits in E, and it's hard to unlearn/relearn a part once you learn it, especially when it's your own composition. I offer this up just for other players: consider alternate tunings when playing covers or writing your own stuff. Just because the guitar is in E doesn't mean the bass has to be.

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