Dream Theater
Live In Tokyo/5 Years in A Livetime (DVD)

THE REVIEW

How many have wondered what might be in the minds of Dream Theater? Perhaps many, perhaps none, but one cannot deny that behind the New York combo lies much care and attention, even to the smallest details, which most might overlook.

Thus, this DVD (needless to say, a double, a tradition now for DT) meticulously explains every step from the band's masterpiece (Images & Words), to the much-debated "Falling Into Infinity," and the tour that followed, the Touring into Infinity World Tour. Therefore, a more than 5-year career overview. Additionally, the 2 DVDs contain all the music videos recorded by the band (very few indeed, 6 in 20 years of career!).

The first DVD captures the band's performance in a concert held in Tokyo in 1993 during the "Music In Progress World Tour," the world tour of "Images & Words". It also contains documentaries and videos taken from the recordings of the famous album and world travels.
The band's performance in the concert? Well... little to report: the band was young and (for the detractors of their latest works) still fresh and in good shape. A spectacular concert but light years away from the complexity of today's show. Plus, there are three videos taken from "Images & Words": "Pull me under", "Another day" and "Take the Time".

The second DVD contains documentaries and various performances from the "Awake" tour to the "Falling into Infinity" tour, and it clearly lays out the controversy with Kevin Moore, and, in the audio commentary of the band, with Derek Sherinian. In this DVD you won't find a proper concert, but clips from TV appearances, from the acoustic concert to the fan club show at Ronnie Scott's in London, in 1995 and various other songs, including a sparse performance of "Metropolis pt1".
We could say it ends here, neither bad nor good. Interesting from some points of view, a bit tedious from others. Another downside: the poor translations of the commentary: you cannot translate the brand Music Man with "the man of music"...

Essential for a fan, others can still delight themselves for a while with DVDs of much different value.