Dream Theater new DVD Teaser

[Del_Duio]

To me Mangini is miles beyond portnoy as a drummer. Portnoy can drum. but mangini is a beast.

 

Mick

 

Man, I don't know. The more I listen to older DT songs the more I realize just how good Portnoy was / is. Like his beats just fit the songs perfectly and complient them in an interesting way. A lot of Mangini parts- awesome as they might be- seem to double up and match the guitar exactly bit for bit and don't really branch out and do their own thing. IMO of course, what do I know? :D

Edited September 1, 2014 by Del_Duio

[Duke1]

Since Mike left DT I've really enjoyed his work with The Winery Dogs and Flying Colours, also the Neal Morse and Transatlantic stuff. I've also really enjoyed the last two DT albums. I think Mike P is a different type of drummer to Mike M. Overall I enjoy the feel of Mike P's more. Having said that I enjoy listening to Mike M. For me it's a bit like Phil Collins for me, there are better drummers (technically), but the way Phil played, especially 76-82 era was just magic, call it feel, in the groove, whatever, I feel that with Mike P as well. Really looking forward to the new live DT as well, looks and sounds great from the DVD teaser.

[PolarizeMe]

 

Wow, this has me more excited for the BluRay! :haz:

[Cygnus 2112]

It's out today, I can't wait to watch it.

[Del_Duio]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8ncb21mbJE

 

Wow, this has me more excited for the BluRay! :haz:

 

Damn, awesome!!!!!

LaBrie sounds great here.

 

Anybody watch the whole thing yet?

[PolarizeMe]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8ncb21mbJE

 

Wow, this has me more excited for the BluRay! :haz:

 

Damn, awesome!!!!!

LaBrie sounds great here.

 

Anybody watch the whole thing yet?

 

I'm gonna see if my Best Buy has the BluRay in stock but otherwise, I have the digital download of the audio. From the four songs I listened to, it's amazing! Much better than Luna Park production and performance wise.

[Steevo]

Apparently the original video was uploaded with Mono sound and a boo-boo of an edit during Petrucci's solo. Here's a re-upload of the video with stereo sound and the fixed edit during JP's solo.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9_tFbFWzqc

 

Sound even more live than original video if that even makes sense...

 

Geeez I love James on this, and as bluefox mentioned the editing is so welcomed. Yep, prob another to add to the list before Chrissy.

[PolarizeMe]

Fortunately, I was able to snatch the only copy of the BluRay my local Best Buy had in stock. I've got this and the recently released Katatonia DVD to watch tomorrow!

[Steevo]

Fortunately, I was able to snatch the only copy of the BluRay my local Best Buy had in stock. I've got this and the recently released Katatonia DVD to watch tomorrow!

 

That's great. Be sure to get back with your take - of course you will :)

[Del_Duio]

I have it and watched the whole thing until almost 1am last night. It's GREAT, I love it.

I'd put it #2 behind Score, which is probably impossible to top. Breaking All Illusions is such a killer song, a classic for sure.

 

The whole second half of Awake? Yes!

 

And holy crap Illumination Theory is actually awesome live, my opinion on that one's a lot better now.

 

Sonically, I think it's much better than Luna Park- Especially Mangini's snare (sounds good on this!) I also like how much the guys seem to be having fun screwing around and stuff during the whole show. The setlist is very good but weird as there's no representation from some of their best albums (No I&W or 6DOIT for example, or ToT for that matter). Weirder still is that IT DOESN'T MATTER because this show is perfect as-is. I think The Shattered Fortress was a good choice for an AA Suite song, since it's basically all of them wrapped into one anyhow and they might not ever play all 5 back to back without Portnoy.

 

The best part for me is during The Mirror when James says: "How the hell can you dance to The Mirror?!" LOL, you'll see it's hilarious.

 

And they actually show Myung again! And you can HEAR him too, wow! I love Portnoy's playing with DT but Mangini really sold me on this performance, they all seem to gel here. And James' singing is SO GOOD in many places, woo hoo!!

 

And to top it off, this 2 DVD set for $25.99 was on sale for $15.99 :)

 

I love this concert, can't wait to watch it again. Finally Free is Epic (even with the subdued drum ending) Highly recommended!!

 

P.S: Those Petrucci signature guitars are f***ing AWESOME. I think he brings out 5 of them in total on this (white & red 7 strings, a black one, a blue one and maybe another I can't remember). I'm sure they cost $50,000 or whatever but they are insane.

Edited October 1, 2014 by Del_Duio

[PolarizeMe]

Oh boy, let my fanboying begin...

 

To be honest, I came into this live DVD with low expectations. But once I saw the two preview clips, I got extremely excited for the release. Now that I've seen it all. It transcended my expectations and more. Like Del_Duio, I think this is their 2nd best live DVD next to Score.

 

Aesthetically, this looks similar to Clockwork Angels Tour in that neither concert videos look cinematic at all (now this maybe be me being a film tech geek here, but those DVDs wasn't in 24fps). The only difference is, Breaking The Fourth Wall is extremely well edited. No shaky cameras, and no arbitrary Steve Harris-esque editing. There was excellent use of multi-cam split screen where you can see Petrucci, Myung, Rudess and Mangini's playing simultaneously which is visually appealing during unison parts. And the best part is that when there's a solo for the most part, they focus solely on the soloist rather than cut needlessly to other band members during the solo.

 

The audio is pretty excellent as well. Unlike to "Live" At Luna Park, Breaking The Fourth Wall actually sounds live. The mix breathes a lot more, and my favorite part about the mix, actual audible crowd noise but more than that, Mangini's drums sound perfect! For the first time in his tenure with DT, his drum kit sounds awesome and it's a joy to listen to. Also, Jordan's keys are more in the mix compared to LALP. There's still too much Petrucci in the mix but actually it works well here cause of Mangini's pounding drum mix.

 

Performance wise...holy f***ing shit. I saw them live a few days later after this performance in NYC and it was just as good if not better than I remembered when I saw them. Other than the entire 2nd half/encore of the show (cause they're perfect by default) my favorite song of that night was Trial Of Tears. Their best performance of the song, ever! The ADTOE songs are better here than on the DVD of its own tour! The Shattered Fortress was a song I could take or leave, but now I have grown immense love for the song. But the real star that night was James Labrie. Wow, I thought his vocals on LALP were excellent, but here they're even better! How is this possible?!

 

I only watched Luna Park only once so far, but Breaking The Fourth Wall is a BluRay that I'll definitely watch multiple times. An awesome momento for any fan who saw them live this year.

[Rod in Toronto]

This guy on the DT Forum posted all the pitch corrections on Labrie´s voice in the new release:

 

 

--"Boston I'm all alone" (Lie) : the word "Boston" should have been A4 then Ab4. It was tuned to two A4s.

 

--"Never come near me again" (SDV) : should be A, Bb, G, A, Bb, G, A (respectively per each syllable) but was instead tuned to G, A, G, A, A, G, A.

 

—RIDICULOUS- "Lifting Shadows off a Dream" (the first chorus): "Dream" was tuned to A4 instead of F#4. NOT EVEN CLOSE. He does this F# with his signature breathy wide vibrato, which is supposed to give it the effect of sliding to a higher note, so whoever did this crap job misinterpreted and tuned it to the 5th of the chord rather than the 3rd. It's not musically wrong, just not what he sang, or what is actually in the song.

 

--"I'll never trust you again" (Mirror) : should be Bb for "I'll never" and A for "trust you again", but was just made into an A the whole time. This mistake was made both choruses (the other one being "Living life so pretend"), probably because whoever was tuning this didn't know what the note was supposed to be.

 

—Another really bad one, very easy to hear- "Living in fear" (Second chorus of Mirror) should be a Bb for "Living" but it was tuned to a B natural. This is exactly what I mean when I say "Thought he was flat on that C#? That's because he's singing a C natural", but in this case it's a B and a Bb.

 

--"And I'll smile and I'll learn to pretend" and "And I'll have no more dreams to defend" (SDV) Were both tuned to end on an F4, when they should both be E4. (It is possible that this one was done purposely, but it doesn't sound like it)

 

--"Not with in his eyes to see, open up, open up / Not much better than the man you hate" (ToT) : "eyes", both "op"s, and "man" were all tuned to C#5, whereas some of them should be C5 natural, or somewhere in between C and C# for the bluesy effect. (On the studio album they are NOT strait C#'s, nor was he ever going for that. It is common for to slide between the 4 and 5 on a pentatonic scale)

 

—a lot of small things such as "With my thoughts wrapped around me" (ToT) : thoughts was tuned to F# when it should have been an F natural. Even if he was originally slightly sharp on that F, it's still incorrect to tune it to an F# if you are going to tune it in the first place.

 

—GLARINGLY OBVIOUS- "People in prayer for me, everyone there for me" (Scarred) Should be F# on both "people in prayer" and "everyone there", but the latter was tuned to G. This is an example of something he might have been slightly sharp on, but I guarantee whatever he sang was a hell of a lot closer to an F# than the G you hear in this recording. (Meaning that even if you want them to pitch-correct it to hear a perfect recording, they could have tuned it to an F# and at least it would have been correct)

 

--"Wash your hands of regret" (the first one) (Scarred) : hands was tuned up to F#4 when it should have been an F4 (a prime example of a note he probably actually nailed live)

[Del_Duio]

^^ See, it's this stuff that just bothers me though. ^^

 

I mean what would people rather have? A DVD like Budokan where everything's awesome except for James' pitch all over the place or one like 4th wall where they tweaked an entire 3 hour concert a handful of times to give us something we'll want to listen to more than twice ever?

 

If you want to talk about voice manipulations and etc, this new one's loaded with Petrucci doing Alex's signature backup vocals on the mic. I have all their other live stuff and I know JP's voice and this is not it. Is he just singing into the mic triggering samples full on now? If you go back to Luna Park and listen to The Silent Man THAT is JP's real backing vocals and they're awesome. He's not a terrible singer IMO, so how come he's not singing live on this one anymore?

 

Rod In Rio, did you get the DVD yet? Curious to hear what you think about it.

[Rod in Toronto]

I haven´t got it yet - just the audio, from an "unnamed source". ;) ;)

 

I´ll get it as soon as it´s released in Brazil, but it may take a while. On the other hand, they are playing in Rio this Sunday, so if the merch stand I selling it, I´ll get it!

[adace1]

Watched some clips of it on Youtube. Possibly their best DVD yet, even if the guitar sound is a bit off.

[PolarizeMe]

I noticed the different note in Lifting Shadows...but despite it being the "wrong" note, it sounded quite nice or at least the way he sang it that I could care less if it was the wrong note and/or if they noticeably pitch corrected his vocals.

[Rod in Toronto]

I don´t mind the corrections either, I just found amazing how this guy was able to pick up on how and where they were done. I don´t think I´d ever be able to recognize corrections like this, unless they were absurdly obvious.

 

I ran 10km today listening to the new live album...it roooockssss!!!!

[Duke1]

On the headphones now, fantastic stuff...

[Cygnus 2112]

I just picked up the DVD, because I can't wait any longer for my Blu-Ray CD Bundle to arrive. I've watched up to The Looking Glass and this is an amazing Concert so far.

[bluefox4000]

Just got around to ordering the bluray. And i got an mp3 of the album off amazon. Sounds wonderful so far. BTW.....I freakin' love Mangini as the drummer for this band. He injected life into them again which they desperately needed.

 

And illumination Theory live may be the greatest thing ever. Hearing the new songs live makes me love the recent record even more then i did.

 

Mick

[Rod in Toronto]

I saw them in Rio last night. Great concert, but it´s a shame that the acoustics ruined the band´s sound. I heard James properly from the second song onwards, Petrucci more or less from the second song onwards. Mangii´s drums were loud, bu Jordan ad Myung were buried in the mix and both of them sounded like a huge mass of unidentifiable noise.

 

I got great tickets by the way: it´s open admission but they let me get in to the vip section before everyone else, I got an autographed poster and a set of Petrucci´s picks.

[bluefox4000]

Finally gonna get my bluray today. unusually slow delivery this time around. Will post my thoughts after i've watched it

 

Mick

[Del_Duio]

I saw them in Rio last night. Great concert, but it´s a shame that the acoustics ruined the band´s sound. I heard James properly from the second song onwards, Petrucci more or less from the second song onwards. Mangii´s drums were loud, bu Jordan ad Myung were buried in the mix and both of them sounded like a huge mass of unidentifiable noise.

 

I got great tickets by the way: it´s open admission but they let me get in to the vip section before everyone else, I got an autographed poster and a set of Petrucci´s picks.

 

Same set as fourth wall? Would be kind of weird to have it be exactly the same, but you never know.

[Rod in Toronto]

Exactly the same set, except for a new Marillion-esque jam at the beginning of Trial of Tears.

[bluefox4000]

I just finished the bluray and wow......their best video release in my opinion. I mean these guys are just a joy to watch.

 

The new tunes come across fantastically live. As i've already said......it makes me love the new album about a thousand times more then i already did. Highlights for me are the entire 2nd side of awake. This release accomplished the impossible. It made me love Space-dye Vest. A tune which never clicked with me. Illumination Theory was AMAZING. just had me grinning from ear to ear.

 

Loved The Scenes from a memory block too.

 

I've said this many many times. but viewing this concert cemented it. Mike Mangini belongs in this band. and blows Portnoy away as a musician. It might seem over the top but it's my view. Love the dude.

 

And the biggest praise of all....Cause it's big with me. Great editing. I have no headache. It will do a shot and......shock of shocks..........stay on that shot for a bit!!!!!!!! Novel idea right? Lol.

 

Great show. nice job from all involved.

 

Mick