dream theater

Stunned

Sep 9th 2010

I sit here shocked, not really knowing what to say. Oh, don’t worry, nobody died or anything like that. In the grand scheme of things this isn’t a gigantic tragedy. And yet here I am, still shocked.

Mike Portnoy has left Dream Theater.

I’m sitting here staring at those words, not really believing that I actually typed them. I found out last night and hoped that I would wake up this morning and it would be a dream or a joke, but it isn’t.

For those reading who might lack the context as to why this is such a huge deal to me, please accompany me on a journey back to…oh…2001, 2002. Maybe a little earlier While listening to a new internet radio station I discovered a song called Fatal Tragedy from a band named Dream Theater. Before this I was listening mostly to top 40/classic rock stuff on the radio, not really connecting with any of it. And when I heard Fatal Tragedy I thought it sounded cool but it didn’t really hit me then. I remember downloading it from Napster and it went into my rotation. I thought the band was some kind of classic rock band that wasn’t around anymore.

Flash forward a bit and I decided to check this Dream Theater band out. I picked up the album Scenes From a Memory and became hooked instantly. I still remember listening to it for the first time, lying on my bed with my headphones on, drinking it all in. This was the first time in my life that I really cared about music. Where I could just sit there…listening.

I started looking around and realizing there was a whole world of bands out there, just like this. People who cared about the music, weren’t afraid of being technical and to hell what the mainstream thought about their 7 minute long songs. I noticed that a lot of the members of Dream Theater had a bunch of side projects. So I checked out Liquid Tension Experiment and Transatlantic. Through Transatlantic I found out about Marillion, Spock’s Beard and The Flower Kings. I got on the Mike Portnoy.com forums and learned about Porcupine Tree and Opeth. Ayreon, Symphony X, Frost*, Bigelf…so many more. Heck even Rush. I knew of rush before but never got into them heavily until now.

My first concert was Dream Theater at The Palladium in Worcester, MA on August 21st, 2004. It was so freaking awesome. They opened with Metropolis Part 1 and I just went nuts. I didn’t even notice that the keyboards weren’t working until 2 minutes into the song because I was just so excited to be there and couldn’t believe they were right there, 40 feet in front of me doing this stuff live.

Since then I’ve seen them 9 times. I’ve met the band once, got my picture taken with them (which was lost when the meet and greet person’s laptop got stolen, oh well). The last time I saw them was earlier this year. At The Palladium in Worcester, MA. The last time ever for Dream Theater as it’s existed, at the same place where I saw them for the very first time.

Dream Theater is responsible for making me CARE about music. Without them I never would have wound my way into this progressive metal/rock world which has truly been a huge impact on my life. This music has been with me through some of the best things and worst things I’ve ever experienced. And one of my favorite periods of time was when I was able to pass on my love for Progressive Metal/Rock to my friend Wassy and experience the journey through her all over again.

Dream Theater will continue on without Mike. But he was such a force in the band that it’s never going to be the same. He handled all of the live production, setlist construction, business deals, album art, promotion, live releases and was a gigantic part of the core writing team of him, John Petrucci and John Myung who have been together for 25 years. Heck, his dad was the one who came up with the name!

The band may be continuing on in name, but it was Mike’s baby, and it’ll never be the same. I’m having a hard time imagining going to a live show and not seeing his gigantic drum kit back there with him spitting everywhere.

Whatever happens and whatever the reasons for the split. I just want to thank (yeah, as if they’re going to read this) Mike and the rest of Dream Theater for 25 years of amazing music. I hope the new Dream Theater can rise to the challenge and give us another 25 (Well, you know what I mean. 25 is probably going to be pushing it at this point)

dream theater, mike portnoy, shock

Friends and Dream Theater in Massachusetts

Jul 12th 2010

Posted by Jason in Uncategorized

2 comments

Probably should have mentioned this around here sooner, but I’m now back from Worcester, MA where Wassy and I went to catch a Dream Theater headlining show during their tour with Iron Maiden.

The weekend was, in a word, awesome.

Earlier in the week we had started to get worried because it was looking like pretty heavy rain for saturday, the day of the show, and we were going to have to wait for about 2ish hours outdoors in line to get in and get the spot that we wanted. And right on schedule, a cold front moved slowly into the area, bringing with it a ton of rain. So we left Saturday morning with umbrellas and the expectation we were going to get soaked, an expectation that was further backed up by the fact that we drove through torrential downpours pretty much as soon as we got out of Albany. We outran the rain just as we got to Worcester and checked into the hotel.

The awesome started earlier than the show since after we checked into the hotel, we headed next door to the Starbucks where we were to meet up with a couple of friends who live on the outskirts of Boston. Kris and Marcy (Bayani and Planet Girl from City of Heroes respectively) arrived a little late (had some issues finding the starbucks we were in, but it was an unfamiliar area for both parties so it was no big deal), bearing lunch from Domenic’s (which was AWESOME) and we proceeded to spend the next 2-2.5 hours talking and hanging out. It was super fun and felt really natural, despite only having met them over the internet.

Sadly, we had to part ways eventually so we could finish prepping and head over to the venue to wait. During our meeting the cold front rumbled on through, but by the time we had finished it was mostly rained out so that worked out really nicely. We walked over to the Palladium and got in line, but as soon as we got there Wassy realized she forgot her earplugs and walked back to the hotel while I held our place. And as soon as she got back, I realized I had pulled the tickets out of my pocket when checking if I had the room key and left them on the bed (!!) So thankfully I noticed before the doors opened and I ran back to the hotel to grab them and return.

All the comings and goings sorted out, we began the 2 hour wait. We got to hear a little bit of Dream Theater’s sound check as we were standing outside, but eventually we were squished up towards the front of the line to make room for more people and lost our stage door location. Thankfully, we had a step to sit on, so we weren’t standing around for 2 hours. Eventually we got into the venue and headed to find a spot. We were aiming for standing somewhere on the tiered seating area, near the bar, but we ended up sitting much closer, on the wall at the back of the pit. Great sight line to the stage, and best of all we could rock while still sitting down.

First thing I’d like to mention is that it got HOT in there. The cooling system of The Palladium consists of opening the venue doors and hoping some of the heat escapes which is only marginally successful. I would have to guess the place was sold out or close to it. The floor was packed in front of us by the time Dream Theater came on and the heat just kept getting more and more oppressive. But it was hard not to get into it with the crowd that was there. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The opener was Charred Walls of The Damned who were very 80s metal inspired. They started out by having a comedian(?) come out and tell some jokes. He was ok… parts of his bit were really hilarious and other parts not so much. The opener was all right. 80s metal isn’t my thing really so it felt a little dated. The sound quality for them was pretty awful until they actually turned up the lead guitarist’s guitar so we could hear him. Not much more to say about them really.

The wait for Dream Theater to set up is always longer than you think it’s going to be, but eventually they came on and it was GLORIOUS. Dream Theater usually plays the theme to the movie Psycho over the PA before they come on and you could tell it was going to be a good show even during this part as the crowd revealed itself to be energetic and totally into it.

It was just the fans and the band, no massive light shows or video screens, just an old fashioned club kind of concert. It was pretty cool for me too, since this is the place where I saw my first concert ever, also Dream Theater in a similar situation (1 off headlining show during a tour where they were opening) and it was neat coming back to the same place again.

The crowd was rowdy, the band had fun and the setlist was awesome. The highlights to me were Home, The Mirror, Lie and the Warped version of Pull Me Under where they sped the middle section waaaaay up. The rest of the set was awesome too, but those were the standouts. I had been bad and looked at what they were playing before the show, so I knew they were going to do Home and The Mirror. It was a very difficult thing for me to not mention this to Wassy who had just told me that Home, The Mirror and Lie were on top of her “songs I want to hear live” list. After they finished playing Home she turned to me and said “That’s it…I can die happy now”. And I told her “Not yet you can’t.” to which she replied “Seriously???”. And a couple songs later they played The Mirror.

The band seemed to be feeding off the energy of the crowd and Mike Portnoy didn’t need to prod us into getting into it very often, if at all since we were already clapping and fist pumping. A mosh pit opened up right in front of where we were sitting which was weird(so far back from the sage) and a bit annoying (I think moshing is stupid) but we were in a spot where we didn’t really need to worry about getting injured.

After the show I was dehydrated and tired with a budding headache, but Wassy convinced me to wait for a bit by the tour busses and see if any of the members of Dream Theater came out. After a guy walked by offering to sell us crack and we heard a sound that was either a car backfiring twice or somebody firing a gun (We’re going to assume it was a car) James LaBrie (the vocalist for those unfamiliar) came out much more quickly than I had thought he would and signed a bunch of stuff. I got my ticket stub signed and Wassy got to tell him how awesome the show was.

We walked back to the hotel and chugged some of the bottles of water that I had brought with us because I knew we would need them, relaxed for a bit and then eventually went to sleep.

I woke up at 6:00ish, feeling warm and noticing that the AC had turned off during the night in the hotel room. I tried getting it to come back on but I couldn’t figure out what the problem was until I went down to the front desk and asked. They then informed me that there was a sensor above the door and one on the AC and if there was anything in the room blocking line of sight between them the AC wouldn’t work. Like the desk chair they put right in that area. Move the chair and all was well. Sigh.

We got up and moving (in some degree of pain) and decided we were well enough to make the 30 minute drive over to the edge of Boston to meet up with Kris and Marcy again at their apartment. We hung out some more and talked about all sorts of stuff, grabbing lunch at this really great mexican place. It was quite awesome. Then on the way back to their place we swung by the local comic store which was very, very good. I ended up buying the first volume of Atomic Robo (thumbs up on Atomic Robo by the way) Sadly, again, we had part ways since we wanted to get home at a decent hour. I’m looking forward to going back over there in October for the weekend to hang out some more and go to the Roger Waters concert in Boston. We definitely need to meet up again.

The drive home was long and uneventful, basically taking I-90 back all the way, stopping at a couple of rest stops for various things but a ton of I-90. We arrived home around 5pm and collapsed from there.

So, in conclusion good friends + awesome show = amazing weekend.

concerts, dream theater, friends, the palladium, wassy, worcester

Top Albums of 2009

Dec 23rd 2009

Posted by Jason in Uncategorized

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Traditionally, this is the time of year where I pick my favorite musical releases of the past 365 days (366 on leap years). This year will be no exception. And…man was this year a gigantic change from last year. Whereas 2008 was kinda slow for music, 2009 was a flood, especially the second half of the year. Quality release after Quality release just kept right on coming.

So without further delay, lets get right into it:

#1 – Transatlantic – The Whirlwind

Transatlantic - The Whirlwind

My number 1 this year is one of my most anticipated albums of all time, which is a followup to my absolute favorite album of all time (Bridge Across Forever). After spending most of the decade on hiatus after Neal Morse turned his energies to writing christian inspired music full time, The members of Transatlantic got back together and came right out swinging again with The Whirlwind.

It’s not nearly as good as Bridge Across Forever, and the sound has progressed from what it used to be, but honestly so have the members of the band. The lyrics, too, have evolved, from being simply spiritual to actually having some religious overtones. I don’t find that distracting enough to count it as a knock on the wonderfuly constructed musical content of this album.

The best parts are when the guys just seem to jam. There isn’t a band out there that has the writing chemistry that this guys do. the 77 minute title track feels cohesive, with themes introduced in the Overture coming back again and again through the song.

Transatlantic is back in busniess and I’m immensely excited to be seeing them live in April.

#2 – Dream Theater – Black Clouds & Silver Linings

Dream Theater - Black Clouds & Silver Linings

If you asked me at the beginning of the year whether the upcoming Dream Theater album was going to be making my top list this year, I would have been doubtful after 2007′s Systematic Chaos fell (very) flat. After it was released though…wow. I was taken totally by surprise, often randomly saying to Wassy things like “Man, I can’t believe the new DT album is so good!”. It was my surefire number 1 until Transatlantic came out.

What we have here is a continuation of the sound of Systematic Chaos but with the missing elements of the Dream Theater sound and, more importantly, song structure added back in. John Petrucci owns this album with his solos, especially The Best Of Times. And Jordan Ruddess, prone to overplaying, reins himself in and plays for the song, not to see how many notes he can squeeze into a bar of music.

That’s not to say the album isn’t technical. It is. But it’s renewed focus on song structure and melody are what makes it work 1000x better than Systematic Chaos did. The only song that falls flat for me is Wither, which just sounds like a dated power-ballad. The Piano version is much better.

I want to specifically mention The Best Of Times which is a song written by Mike Portnoy as a tribute to his father who has recently passed away. Just hearing it for the first time gave me chills (and I even teared up towards the end). The epic guitar solo is one of the best solos I’ve ever heard. Ever. There’s so much emotion and feeling that was poured into the song and it really shows.

#3 – Muse – The Resistance

Muse - The Resistance

This album was a sleeper for me. Released the same day as the latest Porcupine Tree release, I expected it to get passed by as I spent most of my time with The Incident. However…that’s not how it turned out at all.

I loved it on first listen, and every listen after that caused it to grown on me even more. I find it very interesting that Muse is a mainstream band, and yet their sound (especially on this album) has so many progressive rock elements to it. They’re geniuses. They’ve managed to trick the mainstream into listening to prog!

Muse wears their influences on their sleeves on The Resistance, inspired by bands such as U2 and Queen. But instead of a straight up copying of their influences sound, they take it and add to it something that’s uniquely Muse. The United States of Eurasia is clearly Queen inspired, but it’s also very Muse like.

Also they’re not afraid to throw even classical influences into the mix, including the likes of Chopin. Not to mention the Exogenisis Symphony that closes the album. The entire thing feels like it’s Muse sticking it to the entirety of mainstream music, and they’re being embraced for it.

#4 – Long Distance Calling – Avoid The Light

Long Distance Calling - Avoid The Light

This album was also a bit of a surprise for me. I’m not normally one for purely instrumental music as I feel a lot of the time the song structure isn’t interesting enough to really differentiate one song from another. But on a tip from the members of Mike Portnoy.com forums, I went and checked this band out.

What I found was quality instrumental progressive rock, with definite song structure and pacing. They understand how to build a song up from the beginning to a climax and make it interesting. Furthermore, the drumming is really good, probably my favorite part of the album.

It’s not entirely instrumental though, as there’s one song with lyrics which is also enjoyable. The vocalist sounds a lot like the guy from Katatonia, actually.

My only complaint is that it’s a very short album, but I’ll take quality over quantity any day. If you’re a fan of instrumental rock, you own it to yourself to check out these guys.

#5 – Redemption – Snowfall on Judgement Day

Redemption - Snowfall on Judgment Day

Redemption was one of my discoveries from 2007 after seeing them open for Dream Theater in Buffalo, NY. I’ve had my eye on them since. These guys are a progressive metal band fronted by Fate’s Warning’s Ray Alder, backed up by a quality group of players. I really like Ray’s vocals on these releases as I think this type of music fits his style more than Fate’s Warning.

Anyway, this particular release is nothing really new or pushing the boundaries of the genre or even their previous releases. What it is, though, is a rock solid progressive metal album in a genre full of dream theater wanna-be’s who are very much not putting out interesting or quality music. Redemption clearly is influenced by the giants in the Prog Metal field, but they put their own spin on it and make it their own. This album also features some excellent lyrics, another thing that’s hard to find in the Prog Metal genre.

Throw in a track featuring a Duet with James LaBrie of Dream Theater and you’ve got a great album. Don’t mistake me when I say it’s nothing new. It’s still quality material.

Other Releases

Porcupine Tree – The Incident
A solid, if disappointing release from PT. It clicked after seeing it live, but I need to be in a certain frame of mind to really listen to it.
Epica – Design Your Universe
A little too reliant on the growling, but this is one of Epica’s strongest releases Musically yet.
3 – Revisions
A collection of redone and re-recorded songs from 3′s past, this release is good, but not great. The new version of The Game is a bit dissapointing, but I’m really happy with the rest of the songs.
Jordan Ruddess – Notes on A Dream
Jordan records his own piano versions of several Dream Theater songs. I like his focus on the songs that pre-dated his joining the band. His versions of Another Day and Hollow Years are stellar. I love having this on in the background.
OSI – Blood
The weakest of the OSI releases. Just didn’t grab me like the other ones, but it’s got some good songs too it. I think they tried to be a little TOO heavy and that’s not where OSI shines. The best parts are the more ambient songs like Terminal and Radiologue.
Umphrey’s McGee – Mantis
Part prog, part jam band release. This group was one of my new discoveries this year. Very nice for when I’m in the right mood. Some songs lose me a bit, but the first half of the album is very good.
Riverside – Anno Domini High Definition
An album that’s a lot less dark than their previous efforts. Some good stuff here, but it doesn’t quite capture the magic of Second Life Syndrome. Feels a little too short too.
Trans-Siberian Orchestra – Night Castle
The instrumental parts are awesome. The lyrical songs are terribly, terribly generic. Lots of filler here. Somebody needs to make a TSO lyric generator. It’d be pretty easy. Just throw in lots of children, dreams and people singing “on this night”
Scale The Summit – Carving Desert Canyons
This one is good in small doses, but all of their songs sound very similar after a while.

Honorable Mention

Bigelf – Cheat The Gallows was an album that was released last year, but one which I discovered this year. Take The Beatles, Pink Floyd and a liberal dose of evil and throw them in a blender and you get Bigelf. Really cool retro sounding music with a modern twist. Go see them live for full effect…the studio recordings just don’t capture them adequately.

bigelf, dream theater, long distance calling, muse, music, redemption, transatlantic

[Plinky] Memories And Music

Aug 19th 2009

Posted by Jason in Uncategorized

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What three songs remind you of a specific time in your life?

Amazon is being fruity right now, so I’ll put the pictures in later. But here’s the answer

The New Math by OSI

This OSI album will forever remind me of Scuba Diving. That’s a little odd considering the fact that the album doesn’t have the slightest thing to do with scuba diving. But I was taking a scuba course at the local college when it came out and I remember sitting in my car listening to it, waiting for class time.

Anesthetize by Porcupine Tree

This song reminds me of a fish purchasing trip with my friend Wassy. I had just gotten Fear of a Blank Planet (the album this song is on) and was playing it in the car while we were driving around. Later she said “That music you were listening to sounded really cool. What was that?”

That sent her on a musical journey into Progressive Rock and Metal and all of my favorite bands, which was cool because finally I had somebody to talk to about this stuff and go to concerts with.

Fatal Tragedy by Dream Theater

Speaking of musical journeys…this song was my introduction to Dream Theater and Progressive Metal. I heard it as a random pick on the old internet radio station Echo. Echo was a station that learned your musical preferences and played songs you might like along those lines…one of the first ones that did that. It also randomly played a song that was outside your likes and dislikes occasionally, to potentially broaden your horizons.

Well, the random pick was Dream Theater and I really enjoyed it a lot. It took a year or two for me to really check it out further. But once I did, I got Scenes From a Memory and I was hooked. My journey into Prog Rock began.

dream theater, friends, music, osi, porcupine tree, wassy

[Plinky] An Introduction To Dream Theater

Aug 13th 2009

Posted by Jason in plinky

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I talk about Dream Theater an awful lot on this blog since they're my favorite band. They've been described as "the biggest group you've never heard of" and that's a pretty accurate statement.

Since they play Progressive Metal, they can be a hard group to get into. But here's But since I'm trying out plinky.com and this is the prompt for today, here goes my attempt at easing you into listening to Dream Theater. They have such a big catalog that's so diverse, it's hard to pick 3 songs that will work for everybody. I usually would approach this by asking what sorts of stuff they tend to listen to and then selecting appropriate songs that are most like what the person is familiar with.

But if I had to pick 3 songs to expose a random person to everything that is dream theater, here's what I'd pick

I Walk Beside You by Dream Theater

This song showcases their more pop oriented side and is probably one of the more accessible songs in their catalog. Very U2 influenced. You should pay attention to James LaBrie's voice here as he's not everybody's cup of tea. If you like it though, you might also like songs such as Another Day, Hollow Years and The Answer Lies Within. Continue onwards to…

Voices by Dream Theater

Voices is one of my favorite DT songs of all time. This song is a lot more "progressive" than I Walk Beside You and is probably a better representation of their overall catalog. It contains a good mix of both sides of DT, the melodic and the heavy metal. It also introduces you to lead guitarist John Petrucci's solo chops with one of my favorite guitar solos ever.

If you liked this one, you might like songs such as Misunderstood, Blind Faith and Innocence Faded

And if you're still with me…let's head to the heavy stuff

A Nightmare To Remember by Dream Theater

A Nightmare To Remember is on this list for two reasons. First, it's an example of the most recent Dream Theater sound. Second, it's one of the heaviest songs they've produced.

If you like this one, you'll probably like songs like The Mirror, The Glass Prison, And pretty much everything on Train of Thought

dream theater, music

Progressive Nation 2009

Aug 5th 2009

Posted by Jason in Uncategorized

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Progressive Nation 2009 was VERY awesome. As I mentioned before Wassy and I went off to Albany to catch one of our most anticipated concerts of the year. The bands were Scale the Summit, Bigelf, Zappa Plays Zappa and, of course, Dream Theater.

We left for Albany around 3:30 and aside from one small hitch (some local construction had closed one of the lanes of a 2 lane road for 2 freaking miles why the paved it. Totally unnecessary…) we arrived at the parking garage on schedule. We grabbed some sandwiches and headed over to the venue a few blocks away.

Wassy grabbed a ridiculously overpriced t-shirt (seriously…$40 for very thin shirt?? Add $5 if you're XXL) and we settled in for the show.

First up was Scale The Summit which I liked well enough. They were a pretty dorky looking band, honestly. One of the guitarists wore his guitar so high it looked like a necklace. They had good music but it was a little same-y for doing a setlist like that. There's definitely instrumental bands that I like better. After they had their set, we decided to go see what beers they had on tap. They happened to have newcastle which was one of the ones we like (we're kinda picky about beer) and so off we went.

Bigelf started soon after we got back to our seats and man, they blew me away. I liked their studio CD but seeing them live really made the whole thing "click" for me. Very high energy show and their main vocalists is…scary looking. Complete with top hat and a coat with a long beard. I am definitely going to have to pick up more of their stuff.

Zappa Plays Zappa…eh. I had high hopes for this band as it's the sort of music I might enjoy. And sure enough the first couple songs were really good. But then it got…weird. Too weird for me. I need a little song structure in my songs. So instead I spent an hour and 15 minutes being bored.

However, about halfway through the ZPZ set, two obviously huge older Zappa fans came and sat in front of us in matching tshirts and one pair of binoculars. It should be noted at this point that we were sitting in the 9th row. Binoculars at this point seem a bit unnecessary. But use them they did. In fact they sometimes fought over them so they could watch the individual fingerings of the flute/sax player I guess. Anyway, despite being huge zappa fans and practically bouncing up and down through the entire set, they got up and left before ZPZ was finished. They confused the crap out of me…but it gave me something to watch.

After Zappa Plays Zappa, the main wait for DT arrived and, man was it worth it. They have a totally badass way of opening the show this year. Their stage setup is also really cool with a new upgraded video show and some neat stuff that Jordan does with a HDTV behind his setup that has a computer animation of him playing that's synced with the song as he's playing it.

The setlist was A Nightmare to Remember, A Rite Of Passage, Hollow Years, Erotomania, Voices, Prophets of War, The Count of Tuscany and with an encore of Metropolis pt 1. Pretty much the perfect setlist.

Wassy and I were praying that we were going to get Voices this time as it's one of our favorite Dream Theater songs and we thought we'd get it in Washington DC last year, but ended up not getting it. So the moment the first note of Erotomania was played, we went kinda crazy. My throat hurts this morning… But it was so worth it. Voices! It still feels a little like maybe I imagined it. Those were all the songs that I was expecting to hear and even the extended soloing bits in Metropolis pt 1 were pretty cool. Sometimes they can go on too long, but the band was interacting and having a lot of fun which kept things interesting.

James LaBrie was good last night, but I've heard him better. I've also heard him much worse. He hit all the right notes but had a little trouble in Metropolis which is a hard song to sing at the end of the night anyway. He was totally on in the showmanship department. Interacting with the crowd…lots of energy and it looks like he's in better physical shape than he has been in the past few tours too. I was particularly impressed by Jordan and John Petrucci during the introduction to Hollow Years where they had a really neat extended introduction solo that was just the right mix of technical and melodic stuff.

I'd put this as one of the best DT shows that I've gone to (this is my 8th DT show). I do enjoy going to concerts with Wassy as it seems like she has some sort of concert karma that makes the show extra awesome. And going with a friend who's as into it as you are is much more fun than going alone.

After the show got done, a quick walk back over to the parking garage and an easy drive out completed the evening. We ended up making an emergency stop at a McDonalds in Herkimer since we were both pretty hungry after the show and couldn't find anything good on the thruway.

All in all, a very enjoyable evening and well deserving of the anticipation

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concert, dream theater, friends, music, progressive nation