LIVE AT THE MARQUEE

Dream Theater decided to released a live album after just two studio ones. This was not a bad decision, but this album could have been so much more. Since the album was released as a single LP, there are just six tracks here, recorded with superb quality at the famous Marquee club in London. Pull Me Under appears, as you'd expect, and so does Metropolis. For fans of 'When Dream And Day Unite' you get A Fortune In Lies and The Killing Hand, the latter of which is given an awesome new intro titled Another Hand to replace the acoustic guitar solo. Depending on where you live, you can hear one of the two shorter tracks from 'Images And Words', Surrounded or Another Day.

On this tour, Dream Theater used to jam a lot, forming instrumentals that would evolve over the tour. Such instrumentals include Puppies on Acid (to become the intro to The Mirror), Barfbag, Another Hand (see above), Eve and of course Bombay Vindaloo which appears here. This piece, entirely in 4/4, is an experiment in building tension slowly by increasing the volume over time, which it does twice. Petrucci's guitars are on show, and he is very impressive (as always).

Now I know for a fact, that Dream Theater had some amazing shows back in these days. They would play the entire of 'Images And Words' (which is their best album by a long way), play a good selection from 'When Dream And Day Unite' and also play a fantastic selection of tracks that hadn't been released by then. Such tracks include A Change Of Seasons (an intriguing early version) and To Live Forever. If this live album had been expanded to a double disc, they could have fit some of these amazing goodies on here, and the album would have more value for money. As it is though, this album only gives you a small glimpse into the Dream Theater live show of 1993. For a far better experience, see if you can pick up the official bootleg 'New York City 3/4/93' which is my favourite live album/gig they have ever done. 2.5 stars