Progressive metal giants DREAM THEATER have been keeping Finland on their list of stops to tour with great regularly, with their last show here being during the Distance Over Time Tour in 2020, right before the pandemic set in. With a new album from 2021, “A View from the Top of the World,” being tourable now that restrictions are lifted in most places, the band paired up with local ARION to tour Europe, with a set at the new Nokia Arena in Tampere on February 2nd, 2023.
This was our personal first time at the new Nokia Arena in Tampere, which is located pleasantly in a place that isn’t too annoying to get to if you’re coming in from out of town. We showed up in what we thought was good time, but found immediately that there was only one cloak room for the entire arena, which was pretty problematic. It seems the place has its own bar, which is surely nice for people who want to hang out and drink, but for those who just wanted to dip in for an event and then go home, the 30+ minute wait to pick up your coat at the end of the night was pretty annoying.
We managed to navigate ourselves through the line in time to catch ARION come out to “No One Stands in My Way,” making for a great start, as people quickly trickled into the stadium. They went immediately into “I’m Here to Save You,” getting quite a few hands clapping. We began to wonder if the Tampere crowd might be better than what we’ve seen in Helsinki lately, as this isn’t even close to one of ARION‘s best songs, and already people were getting excited (unfortunately, the overall evening proved that they weren’t). Singer Lassi Vääränen took some time to talk to the crowd, being a hometown show for him, mentioning what a dream it is to open for a show like this, before “Punish You” – a personal favorite. The crowd was happy to cheer for the announcement of “Unforgiveable” that came right after.
“Bloodline” is always a personal favorite, one I personally find much more powerful than their traditional one-sided duet closer, “At the Break of Dawn,” because the latter has sadly always relied on a backing track for Elize Ryd‘s part, making it a weak live song as it relies on track vocals and allows no flexibility. “Bloodline” shines as the crowning moment, because Lassi Vääränen has no trouble taking care of Noora Louhimo‘s parts in this duet (which is kind of amazing, if you think about it), making it all so much more organic and free. They put on a solid show, so hopefully we’ll hear some news from their camp about what they’re up to one of these days!
There was no curtain to hide the stage as we waited for the next set – DREAM THEATER‘s latest album cover was projected on drapes behind the stage, foreshadowing yet another set of well-thought-out video clips, tailored to each track. The show was right on time at 20:00, with the band coming out to lead with a nice reminder of how rad they are with a long prog intro before James Labrie made his entrance. “The Alien” worked well as a starting track for the album, so it was unsurprising that it also made for a nice introductory track, crisply showcasing their new material and the fact that they clearly still know what they’re doing up there – all of them are top-notch musicians, still!
I was pleasantly surprised to hear “6:00” follow, as DREAM THEATER‘s discography is so vast that I’m usually flabbergasted if I know anything they play at all. The sound quality was a bit of an issue, with the guitars sounding overly shrill and Labrie sounding murky and incomprehensible, except in his higher range. Word on the street is that he’s not singing as well as he used to though, so this wasn’t the end of the world. The keyboards were drowned by the guitars when the full band was playing, though the bass was getting a good amount of oomph as it was a bit too loud.
James Labrie chatted with the crowd for a while, saying that Tampere rules because it rhymes with PANTERA, which gave the crowd a very hearty chuckle (when you know, you know). He then acted a little bit like he had been rolling in the catnip, so to speak, before having his a chuckle of his own and introducing “Sleeping Giant.” Not knowing the song, it did have an interesting and somewhat ominous vibe that reminded us that we should always remember to spin new DT albums to scout for treasure.
Some khoomei (Tuvan throat singing) opened “Bridges in the Sky,” leading into an angelic choir, while great lizards were shown on the screen. Some days I wonder why I haven’t done a deep dive into this band’s overall vibe yet… this feeling is emphasized when their trippy intro turns into heavy metal with dragons and castles… wait, I though MANOWAR was last night?! Something about this managed to tickle me in just the right way.
“Caught in a Web” was another nostalgic callback to “Awake,” while “Answering the Call” showed off a chuggier side of their sound, along with some great melodic lines. Labrie then explained that they had promised to bring new material to the set, which I’m not familiar with, so I can only say I enjoyed a great deal of it, from flamboyant flamenco guitars, piercing and crisp key soloing, and then just a rockin’, funky part… and only then did I realize the song hadn’t changed. Okay, okay, I’ll listen to the album, you convinced me. This was fun as hell. Even as it continued, it just got epic and dramatic, before turning mellow and poppy… what utterly fantastic madness.
It’s not easy to say what DREAM THEATER song would be the one you have to hear at their shows, but if they do have a “Smoke on the Water,” it might be “Pull Me Under” from their beloved second album, “Images and Words” (1992), which acted as the penultimate track before the title track from their newest release, “A View from the Top of the World” closed out the main set – a long yet effective song! However, they did play an encore from “Black Clouds and Silver Linings” (2009), “The Count of Tuscany,” making for a pretty incredible ending to the show!
Having seen DREAM THEATER a good five or six times, dating way back to Canada in 2005 on a prog metal tour with OPETH, one thing has always been clear: DREAM THEATER will always focus on delivering a solid execution of technical prowess before trying to put on a show. Their material is far too intense to allow for any chicanery on stage from anyone other than Labrie, which only makes it all the more tragic that the sound was so brutally unbalanced on this occasion. Perhaps Nokia Arena is not the best place for music-related events, as it seems that very little thought was put into sound quality in the development of the venue. That said, it’s always nice to see ARION when given the chance and DREAM THEATER might not be as incredible as they were a decade or two ago, but they are still excellent players, so if you’re a fan, there’s no good reason to skip their shows just yet. It seems these guys are showing few to no signs of slowing down.
Written by Bear Wiseman
Photos by Magdalena N.
Setlist
- The Alien
- 6:00
- Sleeping Giants
- Bridges in the Sky
- Caught in a Web
- Answering the Call
- Solitary Shell
- About to Crash (Reprise)
- Losing Time/Grand Finale
- Pull Me Under
- A View from on Top of the World
- The Count of Tuscany (encore)
