An Evening with Dream Theater
YouTube Theater – Inglewood, CA
Saturday, February 22nd, 2025
Review/Pics: Manuel Gay
Dream Theater has a lot on it’s plate these days. Not only did they gave birth to their sixteenth studio album Parasomnia, but they also recently welcomed back to their ranks original drummer Mike Portnoy. They also just turned 40 as a band. It would be an understatement to say this is a busy time for these guys and it is a lot of candles to blow, so what better way to celebrate all of it on the road. Earlier in February, the band embarked on their 40th Anniversary Tour that will take them all over the US and Canada until the end of March.
The band stopped by the YouTube Theater on February 22nd, one of LA’s newest venues standing at the tail end of the SoFi Stadium structure. We often hear people complain after they went to a show, that they had to wait until 8pm for the concert to start and had to sit through 3 bands they’ve never heard of before the headliner showed up. Well this was quite the opposite at this show. Not only there was no opener, BUT also Dream Theater started at 7:30pm. What else could we have asked for? For them to play for three hours long? Yup, that happened too! This was my first time seeing them live and I had high expectations, so I’ll disclose it right away they were all met and surpassed.
Right after 7:30pm, the lights were dimmed, and Bernard Hermann’s Psycho theme came out of the speakers to set a dark and stressful mood in the sold-out theater. The large curtain that was hiding the stage dropped as the five musicians walked onstage playing “Metropolis Pt. 1: The Miracle & The Sleeper”. Right away the energy was off the charts, and it remained that way for the following three hours. I had watched some of their live performances before but witnessing in person the insane skills and musicianship that bonds these guys was something else. The crowd stood up right away (it was a seated show) and remained on their feet for the most part until the end. They then proceeded to play two songs off my favorite albums “Metropolis Pt.2: Scenes From A Memory”. The lighting and the visuals playing on the background screens throughout the night were stunning.
Rare are the occasions to see a band whose musicians are all equally good, but Dream Theater is not your usual band where the guitar player will take a solo or two throughout the show to wow the audience. Pretty much every song they played gave an opportunity to shine for all the members. John Petrucci slayed on the guitar and got the crowd to cheer and clap at the end of all of his raging solos. John Myung made me want to give up playing bass once and for all. His finger picking technique – close to flamenco strumming at times is unbelievable and his ability to play so freaking fast makes you feel like you’re being trampled by a herd of buffalos.
Mike Portnoy holds the rhythm fort from behind his hundred-piece drumkit. At times it felt like he morphed into an octopus and played with extra arms, while popping from behind his kit like a jack in a box in between each song. Jordan Rudess is the wizard responsible for binding it all together. Whether on his rotative keyboard, walking all over the stage with a keytar or using more experimental synthesizers or synth apps on an iPad. If you are familiar with the band, you know that it isn’t unusual for their songs to run over ten minutes, but sometime only contain a few minutes of sung parts. Therefore, James LaBrie came and went on stage throughout the evening to sing his parts, bringing a new wind of energy each time to hype the audience. He sounded amazing, just like he did thirty-something years ago when he joined the band.
The band took a couple of breaks. A fifteen-minute intermission after an hour, and for the encore towards the end. James addressed the audience at times to thank them for being loyal and still being there after forty years. He also took a moment to highlight the return of Mike Portnoy behind the kit after almost fifteen years out of the band. When a band comes back for an encore you can usually expect a couple of hits before calling it a night, but again Dream Theater does what Dream Theater does. They gave us over half-an-hour, with over twenty minutes of it being accounted by my favorite DT song, the absolute masterpiece “Act II: Scene Six: Home”.
I am thrilled I finally got to see them live and won’t wait for the 80th Anniversary Tour to catch them again. If they stop in a city near-by, get yourself a ticket, it will be money well spent. Guaranteed.
Related Links
Dream Theater
