On a more uplifting "note". During my last business trip, I decompressed at one point by going into a Borders bookstore, where I couldn't resist picking up Dream Theater's latest concert DVD, "Live in Budokan" (for the uninitiated, Budokan, or Martial Arts Hall, is Tokyo's top concert venue). The DVD was the same price as the CD, if you can believe that. In an attempt to drive away my dark (and memories-laden) mood I was in, I opened it and popped it into my computer, listening through headphones for maximum listening experience.
Image quality has to be seen to be believed. The video is a delight for amateur musicians: extended close-ups on the hands of various players abound, offering insight into various unusual playing techniques. Both Dolby 5.1 and conventional stereo soundtracks are available: on a computer or with a conventional stereo system you decidedly want to choose the latter.
There's a glitch in the soundtrack a bit over halfway through the nearly 3-hour concert (as several reviewers on Amazon.com noted). Sound quality is outstanding for a live recording, thanks to sound engineering whiz Kevin "Caveman" Shirley.
All four musicians are at the top of their game, and probably technically the best players on their respective instruments in all of rock music, bar none. The weak link in the chain, if any, is the singer, whose "mock-Meatloaf" stage manner gets on my nerves at times. His voice gets understandably a bit tired near the end of what amounts to a 2 1/2 hour set plus 13-minute encore (albeit with plenty of instrumental-only passages).
Hyperkinetic drummer Mike Portnoy displays some showmanship from behind his elephantine drum kit.
Keyboardist Jordan Rudess has just a single Kurzweil keyboard (which drives a rack full of synthesizers and samplers) on a revolving stand, which he regularly spins verious ways to face the audience or specific band members. THe mysterious screen on his keyboard is during close-ups (and in the accompanying "making of" DVD) revealed to be a computerized music stand: a foot pedal allows him to flip to the next page of electronic sheet music. (During the close-up, I saw parts written out on three staffs: presumably two for his both hands and a third with cues from the guitar and vocal. At least, that's the way I would handle it :-)) Another foot pedal switches to the next combination of sounds in the track. Jordan used to work at Kurzweil, programming them for a living, and it shows: besides perfect acoustic piano, strongs, harp, and the like, one hears grungy choir and string sounds, various mutant brass sounds, too many sounds effects to mention, and a variery of scorching lead synthesizer sounds that can make themselves heard through the heaviest guitar playing (no mean feat). During single-line lead passages, Jordan's left hand manipulates a variety of "expression" controllers: not just the usual pitch bend and modulation wheels, but also a ribbon controller, are used to good effect. An additional foot pedal is used as a "wah-wah" controller and of course the keyboard is pressure-and velocity-sensitive.
Bassist John "Spiderfingers" Myung plays 6-string basses for most of the show (mostly in B-E-A-d-g-b tuning, sometimes in C tuning), and Chapman Stick in one song. He's not merely one of the fastest (if not the fastest) players around --- anything an "ordinary" good lead guitarist can play John can do on the bass --- but his sheer variety of technique has to be seen (and heard) to be believed.
But the star performer, as far as I was concerned, was guitarist John Petrucci. No choreographed steps, jumping around the stage, or exaggerated facial contortions during lead lines for him: he plays the most mind-boggling lines as casually as if they were just light warmups. (His "cool" onstage manner contrasts with his unusually expressive playing --- imagine an Yngwie Malmsteen or Joe Satriani with the "feeling" of Jimmy Page or Ritchie Blackmore and the sonic palette of Steve Hackett or Alex Lifeson.) The only way I can tell a lead passage gets a bit tricky even for him is when he puts his left foot up on an otherwise purposeless "fake monitor stand", so he can hold his guitar in the "classical" position while standing. John alternated between 6-string and 7-string guitars in a variety of tunings: I wonder if he'd ever consider one of these beauties (self-tuning guitars), which would allow him to change tunings at the touch of a button rather than by switching instruments. Maybe he's custom-ordered a 7-string version :-)
Most of the last album "Train of Thought" is played, as well as much of the second disc of "Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence". An instrumental medley features flashy passages from most of their past catalog: I didn't care too much for an extended jam at the end of "This dying soul". Some older songs are brought back from retirement, such as "Hollow Years" (from "Falling into infinity") and even a track from their first album, plus of course the old barnstormer "Pull me under". (I remember this track as "pulling over". It was the very first DT-track I heard, on the radio while driving in the San Diego area. This was before I had even discovered Rush, mind you. After the first minute, I pulled over into the emergency lane and stopped so I could listen in detail -- I had never imagined such a weird and wonderful marriage of prog-rock, fusion jazz, and heavy metal could exist!) The lone encore is the 13-minute "In the name of G-d" from their latest album. The lyrics will be taken by some listeners as referring to radical Islamism, but screens in back of the band project footage about "Doomsday cults" closer to home: Jim Jones, the Heaven's Gate cult, and the like.
In summary: a must-have, not just for any Dream Theater fan or prog-rock nut but for anybody wanting to discover music that's both "hard" and musically substantial.
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