Live Scenes from New York

Dream Theater have always made good live albums, but with this release they somehow managed to top even Once In A LIVEtime. This three-disc live set is a Dream Theater fan's Holy Grail. The band's musicianship is as virtuositic (is that even a word?) as ever, and new keyboardist Jordan Rudess proves himself as a more than competent replacement for Derek Sherinian.

The first disc contains nearly all of Scenes From A Memory (!!) and a solo by John Petrucci and Theresa Thompson. The performance of SFAM is great, and is sometimes preferable to the studio versions of the songs. The second disc contains the rest of SFAM, Metropolis Part I, The Mirror, Just Let Me Breathe, a bastardized version of Acid Rain, Caught In A New Millenium (a weird hybrid mix of Caught In A Web and New Millenium), Another Day and a keyboard solo by Jordan Rudess. The band keeps with their fantastic performance throughout the disc, especially in the songs The Spirit Carries On, Finally Free and Metropolis Part I. Finally, disc three contains the A Mind Beside Itself trilogy (Erotomania, Voices, The Silent Man), Learning To Live, and, of course that old Dream Theater classic, A Change of Seasons.

I only have a couple of problems with this album. For one thing, they didn't play Pull Me Under, Ytse Jam or Take The Time. Another thing is that James LaBrie's voice cracks a few times (but this is really too insignificant to be a problem). The awesome setlist and the all-out awesomeness more than make up for this though. If you don't own this album, go out and buy it right now. You won't be dissapointed.