Songfacts®:

• This song is about someone who is both blindly religious and schizophrenic. The voices in his head are made all the more potent and terrifying by their supposed authority. >>

  Suggestion credit:
  Gordon - Oxford, United Kingdom
• Dream Theater guitarist John Petrucci wrote the lyric, which has plenty of room to roam in the 9:53 running time. This is one of the perquisites of being in a progressive metal band. "The biggest hurdle is making sure you have a topic that you feel passionate about, that you want to write about," he said in a Songfacts interview. "And then usually, from there, it's more of the craft. That's kind of like using the same headspace as music."
• By 1994, Dream Theater had found a following among fans of aggressive, intricate music - the kind that couldn't be found in the grunge, hip-hop and R&B that was big. The core group had been together since 1986, but didn't make an impact until their second album, Images And Words, in 1992. Awake was the follow-up; it didn't fare as well but cemented their status as the top progressive metal band of the decade. "Voices" found a place in their setlists for years to come.