Other albums for me at least didn't drag on in songs alone and the song lengths weren't that big so any sort of repetition wasn't insufferable. Problem for me with Fear is they left a lot of running time but didn't do a whole lot with it and as a progressive fan that was what bugged me. Unpleasant experience. Felt like a chore halfway through. I enjoy plenty of long albums and prog but this just failed again to click for me in fact my opinion of it worsened over the last listen or two before it.That's how I felt about pretty much everything they ever put out before this album. Something on this album got me to listen more than once or twice and I do enjoy much of it, although it is repetitious as always. For me, on this album, the music grabbed me, far more than the vocals (as always, which I think that Keenan is insanely overrated as a 'frontman'). Anyway, this album got me to go back and revisit some of their other stuff again, of which some of it I found a new appreciation for.