Dream Theater - 5 Years In A Livetime
Performance
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Dream Theater - 5 Years In A Livetime
Performance
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Note: The Images And Words - Live In Tokyo DVD is a separate review. First of all, this DVD is a steal for Dream Theater fans, considering that it is combined with the Live In Tokyo video, all for the price of a single DVD. 5 Years In A Livetime is a hodgepodge of various videos, concert footage, and behind the scenes clips that are all expertly sewn together, mostly chronologically, to provide an outstanding overview of Dream Theater's career exploits between 1994 and 1998. The video is long (two hours), and contains 21 separate songs or segments, which used to make the VHS version rather frustrating to deal with if you wanted to skip around to your favorite sections of the video. This DVD solves that dilemma by separating each different song/performance into individual chapters for easy navigation via your trusty chapter skip button. This is particularly important, for this video, since it is not just one long performance, like a concert video, but contains various unique performances and videos recorded during different time periods. 5 Years In A Livetime begins on a hilarious note with Derek Sherinian, the keyboardist who replaced Kevin Moore prior to the Awake tour, and was later fired before the Scenes From A Memory sessions, on the eve of recording Dream Theater's Once In A Livetime album. He was excitedly talking about some of the greatest live albums of the past, such as Yessongs, Frampton Comes Alive, and Kiss Alive, and how excited he was about recording the new live album. A scene with guitarist John Petrucci soon follows this up with Petrucci very matter-of-factly saying "Tonight is gonna suck man. This is gonna be the worst album ever. I'm just not in the fucking mood". This was followed a short while later in the video with drummer Mike Portnoy asking Sherinian "Derek what are you doing today?", and him dryly replying "Making history....AND YOU?!". It was priceless I tell you. OK, now that we know that these guys have a sense of humor, they also happen to be some of the most talented musicians in the business, who have put together some of the most impressive prog-rock epics of the last ten plus years, as this video aptly demonstrates. The video gets started on a very heavy note, with a smoking live performance of "Burning My Soul", and then the mood changes dramatically as they switch to a 1998 acoustic show in Rotterdam, with the band performing a fantastic, previously unreleased, song called "Cover My Eyes". They return later in the video to this acoustic show to play four more songs; "Speak To Me" (which has also never appeared on an album), "Lifting Shadows", "Anna Lee", and the epic "To Live Forever". This was one of the DVD highlights for me, as the Rotterdam show was professionally shot, sounded phenomenal, and contained superior versions of every song. Next up is a short segment that shows the band during the 1994 Awake recording sessions. This is often very hilarious, but also has some nice personal stuff including meeting Petrucci and Portnoy's kids, and Portnoy explaining why Kevin Moore left the band. The short answer to that is basically "creative differences". What a shame, because Moore is my favorite keyboardist of the three, not because he is the most technically brilliant (he's not), but because he wrote many of the band's best songs, and was rarely overdramatic like Jordan Rudess can be. Their songwriting has significantly weakened, in my opinion, since the Awake album, with the exception of some of the material on Scenes From A Memory. Moore hasn't done anything that has impressed me since leaving Dream Theater ten years ago either. Three videos are included on the DVD beginning with "Lie", from the Awake album. This is one of the heaviest songs on the album, with a relentless groove, but the video has "cheesiness" written all over it. It basically features the band shot on location out on the mean streets of New York city, all dressed in their Sunday-best, full-length, black, leather jackets to get that bad-ass rocker vibe going. It is just a stupid video. The next two videos are for the ballads "The Silent Man" and "Hollow Years", which fair much better. "Hollow Years" is especially good, and features actors portraying the song's storyline. The first real concert footage starts with performances of "6:00" and "Voices" from the band's 1994/1995 Waking Up The World tour. This tour featured new keyboardist Derek Sherinian, who had just taken over for Kevin Moore. Both performances were outstanding, and showcased how good Sherinian could be. Next up was a 1995 cover show Dream Theater performed at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club in London. This was the second highlight of the DVD for me. The A Change Of Seasons cover songs were taken from a similar show they did in Japan. The first song performed was Metallica's thrash metal song "Damage Inc.", which featured the singer from Napalm Death on lead "vocals". If I can be candid for a moment.....this sucked!...BAD! The singing was especially horrendous - remind me to never buy a frigging Nepalm Death album. Now, the real reason I called this segment a highlight, is because of the next two songs. First up was "Easter", featuring Steve Hogarth and Steve Rothery from Marillion. This is possibly my favorite Marillion song, and this particular version was one of the best I have ever heard. Petrucci provided the perfect accompaniment to Rothery's excellent soloing, and made the song even more majestic and powerful than the original. Who'd of thought that they could top that great performance, but they did just that by bringing Steve Howe onstage to play Yes' "Starship Trooper". The DVD cut into the performance as the instrumental "Wurm" section of the song kicked in. It was great to see the giddy expressions of awe on Petrucci and Portnoy's faces as they jammed with one of their idols on this Yes masterpiece. The DVD ended on a strong note, first with a performance of "Metropolis Pt. I" from the 1997 Monsters of Rock Festival. This segment also featured some great backstage footage as Portnoy and Sherinian mingled with other rock luminaries including Rob Halford, Steve Morse, Uli Jon Roth, Don Arie, Vinnie Paul, and Roger Glover. The audio and video quality was not the best during this song, it sounded like it was recorded straight from the sound board, but the performance was outstanding. This segment was followed by a three song performance from Paris, France filmed during the band's 1997/1998 Touring Into Infinity world tour. "Peruvian Skies" had snippets of Pink Floyd's "Have A Cigar", Metallica's "Enter Sandman", and Yes' "Siberian Khatru" mixed in at the end, which REALLY made the song's influences, and the band's influences, very obvious. This song led straight into "Learning To Live", whose length was abbreviated as it merged into "The Crimson Sunset", the final section of "A Change Of Seasons". This particular show would have made for an incredible full length DVD, as it was recorded impeccably. The performances were incredible, the stage show was fantastic, the camera work was perfect, and the sound mix was outstanding. This definitely leaves you wanting more. Overall, the audio and video quality were excellent with some of the segments being inferior than others. The extended live segments all had outstanding 5.1 surround mixes that captured the energy of their live show. The special features section includes a band commentary track that runs for the entire length of the DVD, and features all members of the band providing a wealth of interesting background information, as well as some hilarious self-depreciating humor. Mike Portnoy produced this DVD and he gets an enthusiastic congratulations from me. Now if he would only go out and remix that shitty sounding Scenes From A Memory DVD with 5.1 surround. Reviewed by Paul M. Roy - September 2004 |
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Running Time: 119 Minutes |
DVD Release Date - July 2004 |