Progressive rock and metal have always been underrepresented in the world of music festivals. If you weren’t able to travel to some of the big festivals, you were left out…until now. Grammy Award-winning Dream Theater has created DreamSonic, a touring festival of fantastic progressive artists that is hitting North America throughout June and July.
The night begins with Animals As Leaders, led by guitar wizard Tosin Abasi. Abasi is joined by guitarist Javier Reyes and drummer Matt Garstka in this instrumental trio. The band released its fifth album Parrhesia in March 2022. Seeing Abasi live is a real treat. He is one of the great instrumentalists of the genre and the crowd, as sparse as it was, appreciated the talent on the stage. The band’s nine-song set touched on all of their records with the exception of 2011’s Weightless.
Next on the bill was the musical enigma that is Devin Townsend. Townsend has released nearly 30 very diverse records in his prolific career. His latest, Lightwork, came out in late 2022. It’s been over a decade since Townsend played Connecticut so this was a special event. Always in good humor, Townsend made a few remarks concerning the small crowd, but his band, featuring the incredible Mike Keneally on guitar and keys, James Leach on bass, and Darby Todd on drums, played as though the venue was packed to the rafters. With the exception of the material from Lightwork and the Devin Townsend Band classic “Deadhead”, the 8-song set was mostly comprised of tracks from the first decade of his solo career. Townsend’s blend of humor with incredible technical skill certainly won over the crowd.
At last, it was time for the main event, Dream Theater. Dream Theater has always been one of my favorite bands and one I have seen many times over the years. As always, the band played amazingly well and vocalist James LaBrie seemed to be in great voice throughout the night. The band started their set with their recent Grammy Award-winning single “The Alien” from 2021’s A View From The Top of the World. “Sleeping Giant” and “Answering The Call” from that release were also played within the first 4 songs of the night.
While the sound was a bit muddy at times (could have more to do with the venue than the band, the same could be said of the attendance), the band was in fine form. Jordan Rudess on keyboards has become the best in the genre while guitarist John Petrucci, bassist John Myung, and drummer Mike Mangini continue to amaze year after year.
The size of the Dream Theater catalog (15 studio albums) combined with lengthy songs always makes it difficult to fit all the songs people want to hear into a single set. For DreamSonic, the band touches on Awake with “Caught in a Web”, Black Clouds & Silver Linings with the epic track “The Count of Tuscany”, and, of course, Images and Words with the classic “Pull Me Under”. The highlights of the night, however, were reserved for the ending run of Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence, “Solitary Shell”/”About to Crash (Reprise)”/”Losing Time/Grand Finale”, and one of the great live concert moments of the year, “The Spirit Carries On” from Scenes From a Memory.
The setlist would have been great for a Dream Theater summer tour, but for the inaugural run of a new festival, I would have liked to see something a little more special and less reliant on the last record. A full run-through of the “Six Degrees” suite would have been amazing, just something to show that this is a special event as opposed to a continuation of the last tour. The encore performance of “The Spirit Carries On” was one of the great live songs I’ve seen in a long time. Joined by Mike Keneally on keyboards, Devin Townsend on vocals, and Tosin Abasi on guitar, the song just soared and created the perfect end to the evening.
While the first edition of DreamSonic succeeded musically, judging by the small Bridgeport crowd, attendance could be an issue if the festival is to continue. The idea of this festival is a great one, but perhaps another band with a similar draw as Dream Theater is needed to bring the crowds. Adding a band like Queensryche or even Steve Hackett to this bill would have really created a festival atmosphere and gotten everyone excited for the next run. Hopefully, the idea of a touring festival headlined by a band as big as Dream Theater would be enough to lure a band like Marillion to the US or even entice someone like Ray Alder to put a solo band together. The options are endless and the future is wide open for DreamSonic.
