Live at Centre Bell in Montreal, Quebec on March 21st, 2014.

Dream Theater is a band that almost completely changes its set list for every new tour. In addition to this fan-friendly attitude, the band chose to go for another “An Evening with Dream Theater” approach on their current tour which means that there is no opening act but three hours of majestic progressive metal music including a short pause of fifteen minutes. The first time I saw the band in Montreal back in 2010, they only played six more metal orientated tracks as opening act for Iron Maiden. When I saw them for a second time in Quebec City in autumn 2011, they had brought Trivium as an opening act and played for around two hours featuring fifteen tracks. Now, I was excited to see a first full length show in Montreal’s famous Bell Centre.

A little issue with this approach is that the show starts very early. I was quite under pressure to get a taxi from my job in the afternoon in Gatineau to Ottawa, take the bus from Ottawa to Montreal, meet my friend, get to the next metro station and make it to the Bell Centre but we managed to be there somewhere between twenty and thirty minutes before the show started. This was obviously not the case for everybody. When the shows started, something like forty percent of the seats were still empty and many fans only arrived two or three songs into the set. Even after this, around twenty-five percent of the seats were still empty and the atmosphere was surprisingly shy. The fans had been much more outgoing two and a half years earlier in Quebec City.

Visually, this show was by far the best I have seen from the band. There was an entertaining animation video that connected the different cover artworks of the band in a creative way while “False Awakening Suite” was being played in the background. A big curtain that covered the stage fell when the band hit the stage. The stage itself looked very creative as if the band was playing in a suburb of a big city. One could see walls with different graffiti including the name of the band written in German, closed garage doors or broken windows for example. This was very nice to watch and impressed me much more than the decorations of the other two concerts I had seen.

The band kicked off its show for real with a big bang and a dynamical rendition of their last record’s first single “The Enemy Inside”. The track was accompanied by the intriguing official video clip of a war veteran who can’t fight his inner demons. Even though the vocals had to deal with some sound issues in the beginning, the song itself was performed with much more emotion and energy than on the last album. This would also be the case for all other songs of this record. Maybe I need to re-evaluate my opinion on the last self-titled album that wasn’t exactly my favourite from them.

Dream Theater continued its first part of the set with “A Shattered Fortress”. In my opinion, this complex song was a little bit misplaced so early in the set and is also one of the weaker tracks of the amazing Black Clouds & Silver Linings. The band couldn’t quite keep the energy of the opener in my opinion.

The progressive metal veterans then went in a smoother direction with the enchanting “On the Back of Angels” and the amazing progressive rock track “The Looking Glass” from their new record. Especially the latter track worked very well on stage with James LaBrie’s soaring vocals and the melodic and Rush inspired guitar riffs by John Petrucci. At this point, I was entirely enjoying this show.

The different songs were sometimes connected by short animated video sequences where an old yellow car would drive around in a city, on the countryside or on the beach to get to different places where Dream Theater’s music would be played. These animation sequences were effective, harmonious and short enough.

Dream Theater finished the first of three parts of the set with the epic and rarely played “Trial Of Tears”, the amazing new instrumental track “Enigma Machine” featuring a short but not too impressive drum solo by Mike Mangini and a much more addicting clip featuring all current band members as comic heroes on their quest to find a treasure in a dark dungeon, the beautiful and light-hearted “Along for the Ride” and finally the epic “Breaking All Illusions”. At some point, Jordan Rudess’ keyboard disconnected during a longer instrumental part but his colleagues saved the track very professionally and a few minutes later, the keyboard sound was back again thanks to the help of somebody in the sound department and Jordan Rudess played as if nothing ever happened.

The band then took a break of fifteen minutes and presented a video to the crowd where people from all around would play impressive cover versions of different Dream Theater songs or just have fun by parodying the band’s procedures to pick a new drummer for example. This collection of clips was entertaining to watch and the break passed very quickly.

For the second part of their set, Dream Theater would go on to play the last five tracks from Awake to celebrate its twentieth birthday. Along with “The Mirror”, “Lie”, “Lifting Shadows Off My Dream” and “Scarred”, this also meant that the band played the atmospheric closer “Space-Dye Vest” written by Kevin Moore. The band changed the original arrangements a little bit but this didn’t steal anything of the original’s magic. From the Awake set, this song was by far the most surprising and touching one. I hope that the band continues to play this track here and there in the future after so many years of ignorance. The band ended its second part of the set with the epic “Illumination Theory” from the last album which was animated by a colourful clip and a great light show. The song had its lengths on the album but worked pretty well next to the Awake songs on stage. This was another very positive surprise.

The band just took a very short break of maybe two minutes before they came back for the encores and the third and last part of their set, dedicated to Metropolis Part Two: Scenes from a Memory. The band underlined the fifteenth anniversary of its famous conceptual record. The band started with the diversified double pack “Overture 1928” and “Strange Deja Vu”. Then they played the completely insane instrumental track “The Dance of Eternity” which is and probably will always be the band’s greatest instrumental song. The entire band minus James LaBrie showed off its incredible skills in this track. James LaBrie then gave a comeback to give his best performance of the night in the closing “Finally Free”. It was incredible to see that he was able to pull off such a performance after almost three hours of work. He just seems to be like good wine: he gets better as he gets older. The entire band deserved minute-long standing ovations after this last highlight.

After 165 minutes of playing time and a total length of around 180 minutes, my friend and I quit the Bell Centre with great feelings. I was finally able to get a good supper around 11 p.m. just next to the Bell Centre. We discussed about the great concert we had just watched. If Dream Theater comes back anytime soon to Montreal, I guess both of us will once again be “along for a ride”. If you can still get tickets and catch the band up on their current tour, just go because it’s worth your money and time.

Set list:

Along for the Ride Tour, North American leg

Act I

False Awakening Suite 

(Intro)

1. The Enemy Inside 
2. The Shattered Fortress 
3. On the Backs of Angels 
4. The Looking Glass 
5. Trial of Tears 
6. Enigma Machine 

(with drum solo by Mike Mangini)

        7. Along for the Ride 

        8. Breaking All Illusions 

Act II

        9. The Mirror

       10. Lie 

       11. Lifting Shadows Off a Dream 

       12. Scarred 

       13. Space-Dye Vest 

       14. Illumination Theory 

Encore:

      15. Overture 1928 

      16. Strange Déjà Vu 

      17. The Dance of Eternity 

      18. Finally Free 

      19. Illumination Theory 

(outro)

Dear readers of my blog,

I just wanted to share a quite interesting high school project with you. This one is about a dystopian short story in form of short diary entries. In the future, I will update more interesting school projects I had been working on since August 2013. I hope you enjoy this one and can take some inspiration from it.

Sincerely yours,

Sebastian Kluth

“The most important year of my life” – A science-fiction short story

Group:______________________Date:_____________________

Team member 1: _______________________________________

Team member 2: _______________________________________

Team member 3: _______________________________________

Your name: ___________________________________________

Task: Get together in teams of four. Every student has to read a different part of this short story. Underline the words you don’t understand. Use a dictionary and write the translations next to the text. Answer the questions of your part only. Everybody has to explain her or his part to the three other group members. You all have to write down the answers of the other team members on your document. In the end, answer the questions below the text together.

Part one:

August 23, 2077: I’m glad to go to high school in my new city. Everything is so big, impressive and organized here. I already met a few new friends like the two funny boys next door, a smart guy called Jason and the charming Xia.

October 16, 2077: Today, they celebrated the tenth anniversary of the armistice and the seventh anniversary of the World Council. There were big military parades in the megalopolis of Boston-Washington. The teachers told us that we had to cheer as loud as we could. Towards the end of the parade, our legendary President Sir Wilfred Kingston appeared on the balcony of the Parliament. He looked a lot smaller than I would have thought. His voice was annoying. The look of his cold blue eyes frightened me when he proclaimed “assimilation, obedience and unity” to the people. I saw a few men demonstrating against the President. They got knocked down by the police and abducted in a big black van. They would pass the rest of their lives in Dissident Prison on Cuba.

Question 1: Where does the storyteller live?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 2: Why is the storyteller afraid of the President?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 3: What happened to the demonstrating men?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Part two: 

November 22, 2077: In the media, our legendary President Sir Wilfred Kingston declared a total war against the Eastern Empire. Old and young men of my neighbourhood celebrated with their families before they joined the training camps to get ready for the battles. I saw the police taking our neighbour out of his home by force. His pregnant wife and two boys were crying. He didn’t want to join the armed forces but he didn’t have any choice.

December 7, 2077: I had always had a crush on Xia, the Chinese girl in my English class. Today, she wasn’t there anymore. The big bully Tommy told me that she couldn’t stay at our school because of her ancestor’s origins. She had to go to a special school for re-educational measures somewhere in Alaska.

December 16, 2077: Three days before his eighteenth birthday, my older brother Dave disappeared. He only left a letter telling my mother and me that he would try to make his way down to Colombia to join the Resistance. He didn’t want to go to war and die in a foreign land like our father did when he fell somewhere in Russia in the year 2067.

December 20, 2077: Today, my handicapped friend Jason wasn’t at school. The principal told us that all handicapped students would now go to a special school for disabled second class students somewhere in Saskatchewan. Our principal was proud to call our school a first class elite school.

Question 4: Why were the neighbour’s wife and two sons crying?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 5: Why did Xia have to leave the school?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 6: What happened to the storyteller’s father?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 

Part three: 

January 11, 2078: My mother and I took my grandmother to the Council Hospital because of her pneumonia. The doctors told us that they couldn’t do anything for her because she was only a second class elder. We brought her to an independent clinic. They told us that the treatment would cost 150,000 Mundi*.

*”Mundi” is a currency that replaced the dollar and the Euro in 2072. 

January 29, 2078: My mother had sold our house to a pharmaceutical company and our belongings to the World Council Bank to pay for my grandmother’s treatments. My mother and I went to live in a shelter in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Therefore, I had to quit my school because I wasn’t considered as first class elite member anymore.

February 11, 2078: My grandmother died today. The treatments didn’t work out. There was no way to get our money back.

February 19, 2078: Today, we received a letter from the World Council Ministry of Foreign Affairs. My brother got caught while trying to attack and take over a cruise ship for millionaires at Panama Canal. My mother was blamed for the incident because she hadn’t taught her son the values of the World Council. She had to go to a labor camp in Southern Mexico for eighteen months. The same day I was taken to an orphanage.

Question 7: Why did the storyteller have to leave his school?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 8: Why did the storyteller’s grandmother die?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 9: Why was the storyteller taken to an orphanage?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Part four: 

March 29, 2078: The work on the fields and in the mines was very hard but the educators of the orphanage had no pity. Today, they almost beat a young boy to death because he had stolen some raspberries that were supposed to be picked up for a supermarket in the wealthy city of Los Angeles.

May 4, 2078: Today, the enemies bombed our West Coast for the first time. The World Council decided that all children above the age of fourteen had to go and defend our country. I felt so lucky that I was only thirteen years old but I knew that my birthday was only a few months ahead.

July 23, 2078: Today was my birthday. The next day, I had to go down to the south. The enemies had already invaded South America and parts of Central America up to Guatemala.

August 19, 2078: Tomorrow would be my first day on the battlefield. The enemy lines are only a few miles away in Central Mexico. The training camp had been short and intense. I feel so tired. I’m afraid to die. My brothers in arms feel the same. What can we do?  

Question 10: Why did the educators beat a young boy?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 11: Where did the enemies first attack the World Council?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 12: Why did the storyteller have to go to war?

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Discuss and answer these questions in your group:

Question 13: Do you think that this kind of story could be realistic for the future? Give three reasons to justify your choice.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Question 14: Create a list of keywords of all negative and positive aspects in this future world:

Negative elements:                          Positive elements:

________________________           ________________________

________________________           ________________________

________________________           ________________________

________________________          ________________________ 

________________________          ________________________ 

________________________          ________________________ 

________________________          ________________________ 

Question 15: How could the story end? Write a very last diary entry.

August 23, 2078: ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Exmortus – Slave To The Sword

March 13, 2014 in Reviews by Sebastian Kluth