A Nightmare to Remember

Dream Theater @ The Orpheum Theater, Minneapolis, 2009.08.21

Once again Dream Theater has embarked on a Progressive Nation Tour. This year's show, despite being propelled by a massive amount of energy and the usual precision performance of the band, suffered from an abysmally awful setlist.  The show consisted of three songs from the latest album, featuring some of their heaviest material, and roughly one song from every other album from the last nine years, which meant the exclusion of Images and Words, Awake and Falling into Infinity [1].  This willful abandonment of their three best works seems to me to be a pure sacrilege. It's as though they have gone from a progressive band with metal influence to throwing away their past and trying to be the heaviest progressive metal band.  Ever since Train of Thought the band has tried to push the envelope too far.  Octavarium and Systematic Chaos came out well, but the latest- Black Cloud & Silver Linings falls right back into that trap, as it tries to be loud and heavy for no reason.

I have to give credit to Dream Theater for switching up their setlists, and I've always hated it when bands have to play "that one song." But I still think that their are some essential elements to the career of any band which can hopefully still be kept fluid and dynamic.  For Dream Theater, I think a show must consist of one of the following: Pull Me Under, Metropolis, A Change of Seasons, or Surrounded.  I guess that means that there must be some reference to Images and Words, or at least some selections from Awake or its B-sides.  This night's list started as an alternate that usually contained Hollow Years to at least slow things down for a moment and most contain Take the Time (the night before).  The prime sets contained Metropolis (such as the next night). There was even one performance of Pull Me Under (two nights before) and the inclusion of The Camera Eye in Toronto (four nights earlier).  I could point to virtually any previous night of the tour and show why it was a better setlist.   But it seems the sets are getting increasingly newer and heavier, and here the line of balance was severely crossed and the result is something that is frustrating to the ears and to the brain.

As for Progressive Nation 2009, I'm bewildered by the inclusion of Zappa Plays Zappa.  If anything it sounds like Progressive Nation 1978, and I wouldn't even call it progressive, just psychedelic weirdness produced by a lost decade of excessive substance intake.  The performers were quite good in their own respects, but the songs are, well not really songs in this sense - just freeform jams, lacking a basic necessary structure.  It seems a waste when there are many good progressive bands out there, Enchant for instance, that could fulfill the intent of the tour. But Dream Theater keeps recruiting the weird or hyper-heavy metal bands. I think its time for them to take a rest from Progressive Nation, and do a well planned tour consisting of a extended set spanning the history of their work which highlights the quality and depth that they can achieve.

Setlist:

A Nightmare To Remember /A Rite Of Passage /Keyboard Solo/ Prophets of War /The Dance of Eternity /One Last Time / Solitary Shell / In the Name of God /The Count Of Tuscany

[1] When Dream and Day Unite and A Change of Seasons not included.