Saw three hours plus of Dream Theater in their first Toronto appearance last night. They played two one-and-a-half hour sets. The band is just stunning. There cannot be a live act that has more talented musicians than this group (their ability to write songs is a different matter). They got off to a slow start in my opinion with about forty minutes of prog-fusion bombasticism that was amazing to watch, but left a lot to be desired musically. I suppose this was stuff from their new album, which I am not familiar with. Then they did about twenty minutes or so from Scenes From A Memory, with a few scattered things from their other albums. The first set was not overly audience friendly, but highly enjoyable, with the audience standing for most of the performance.

As good as the band was in the opening set, the second set uped the ante by at least 50% with an outstanding selection of songs with more melodic vocal lines. At one point Jordan Rudess and John Petrucci played about a three minute, simultaneous, note-for-note, shredding and keyboard solo. No matter who you think is the best guitar player you've ever seen live, you aint seen nothing until you've seen petrucci. It was friggin' amazing! Myung and Portnoy were solid and outstanding. La Brie was in good form, and usually left the stage after the vocal parts leaving the four other members to solidly rock and entertain with their high energy and impossibly complex playing skills.

The encore was the 20 minute A Change of Seasons suite.

I was glad to see that they gave Jordan Rudess much more time in the spotlight than I recall from seeing them about a year ago.

The band is not for everybody, but if you've never seen them, pick up their DVD and be prepared to be amazed. See what a bunch of Juliard Music grads can do when they decide to push the frontiers of modern music.

It's just like nothing on earth!