The Guitar Player

Movements: Octavarium has a very rare quality in which it is not an epic story as a whole, but 5 individual epics, each united with the same theme in which all of them end exactly where they begin. I. Someone Like Him 0:00 – 8:47 Lyrics by John Petrucci Beginning with a lengthy Continuum / lap steel guitar solo by Rudess, this section is told from a first-person perspective. It portrays the thoughts of a person as he decides on what to do in the course of his lifetime, as well as his wish to never become an ordinary person. He succeeds in living an extraordinary life, but reflects upon it, and ends up wishing he had become an ordinary person, ‘Someone like Him’. This is also in line with the ‘Full Circle’ theme of Octavarium: “this story ends where it began”. In this movement, Petrucci uses his signature twelve-string double-neck guitar. He has only used it once before on Six Degrees of Inner Turbulance’s “Solitary Shell.” II. Medicate (Awakening) 8:48 – 13:49 Lyrics by James LaBrie A person wakes up to discover a doctor sitting at his bedside. The doctor informs him that he has been in catatonic sleep for 30 years. The doctor, however, believes he was able to cure him. Suddenly, the patient is in dire need of help as he feels his conscience fading. The doctor prescribes a higher dosage of medicine, but it doesn’t seem to help. Despite the doctor’s failure in assisting him, the patient tells the doctor that he’s not at fault, and that he shouldn’t feel ashamed. Eventually …
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