METROPOLIS 2000: SCENES FROM NEW YORK

Of the three live DVDs I've now watched of DT this one impressed me the least. It is nice for fans of the Metropolis album to get to see it performed live but as a casual fan I much preferred seeing many different albums covered as they did on Score. This show was also far more annoying from the visual perspective. Lots of cheesy graphics and heart attack editing with split screens, tri-screen, quad-screen. Some pretty laughable video clips were used to narrate the story, complete with bad acting and of course the spinning newspaper headlines coming at you flashing "Young Girl Killed!!" The picture and sound quality were significantly weaker than on Score as well. The lighting is not the best which hinders the view a bit. The upside of course is the instrumental performances. Regardless of my view of the material I can enjoy watching these guys play live and add on the third star for that. Petrucci and Portnoy are out of this world on some of these tracks with incredibly powerful playing. Myung is as well when I'm able to hear him. Labrie is usually a problem for me to get past with his presence and this was no exception, but I've learned to tune him out for the most part and enjoy the band. A mixed bag from my point of view. Fans will love it, but I'd recommend casual fans and newcomers check out Score first for a better overview and much better production quality. This is a decent live DVD purchase but by no means an exceptional one when compared to things like Be or Arriving Somewhere.