I just finished watching the DVD and it is indeed spectacular.
The venue itself was better than the other ones. I also thought that the DVD did a better job showing the "human" side of the players, too. The crowd absolutely loved
Mike Portnoy, which is understandable considering he lived in Japan (
Dream Theater is famous there, too.) Then, when
Joe and
Steve bowed to one another, the fans went crazy;
Petrucci looks back at
Portnoy, and the two laugh, as well. Great camera work, great feel, great environment.
Also, who knew that
Satch could speak Japanese so fluently?!
REVIEW:
I thought that
Petrucci's set was amazing. "Glasgow Kiss" has to be one of the coolest songs I've heard--I love the "pick-me-up" style scales he uses. I also have to say that
Petrucci's set was the most straightforward, balls out performance. It was just three guys--
Mike,
Dave, and
John--and they all did their part. It kind of reminds me of
Cream.
Portnoy was great on drums,
Petrucci was great on guitar (though near the end it got repetitive, it would've been killer live), and
Dave did great on bass. Probably my favorite performance.
Vai came out and I was ecstatic. I couldn't believe that I was finally going to get to see him play "The Audience is Listening..." What came next, though, was disappointment. His tone on the song was terrible. I was really looking forward to seeing him play it live, but it didn't sound much like the recording, at all. When he got to the solo, I was hoping for him to nail it, but instead it sounded like he tried to "whammy" his way through it. The band's sound on the performance wasn't that great either--it sounded muddy to me.
The Breed definitely put on the best show though--
Jeremy reminded me a lot of
Tommy Lee. The rest of the set was great, it just seemed to start off slow.
Speaking of slow, next comes
Satch's set. I loved
Joe's performances on the other DVDs, but on this one it seems like he mellowed out. He had some cool parts (like when he was using the whammy pedal), but the set seemed drawn out, overall. Still a superb job on his part, but I thought that it didn't live up to the other DVDs.
The jam was outstanding. "Foxey Lady" was good, even though
Joe couldn't sing it.
Petrucci nailed the solos like he was playing them straight off the records. "La Grange" was great--
Billy's singing was perfect. The breakdowns in the song were great, too. I don't think that
Vai did a poor job on the solos, he always plays like that--it's his style.
Satch, of course, has no problem improvising, though he seems to stay around the same frets a lot.
Petrucci's alternate picking didn't bother me--it was funny when he would look over at how
Vai would do certain things, though. Then came "Smoke on the Water". I wish that
Portnoy could've played with the guys more, but
Jeff did well. This was probably the best jam song of the night.
Petrucci's solo almost matched
Blackmore's off the live version note for note. The entire song seemed like the perfect
Deep Purple tribute--the singing was perfect.
You don't want to miss the soundcheck either--it really shows the guys' "human" sides.
So, you wanna' know if it is worth buying? Of course it is--It's the best G3 I've seen!
Excuse me, I'm going to go watch it again.
