2019 set list and tour discussion (**KEEP ALL SPOILERS HERE**)

[Setlist Scotty]

In a written interview for a brazilian fan club, JLB said that DT will play all the Scenes when they come to South America. 2 good news at once!
https://www.facebook.com/335722947283379/posts/380817452773928?s=100000056893649&v=i&sfns=mo

They only needed to ask him when

I would imagine probably 2020 after they tour Europe again, based on what JP told me as I mentioned here:
https://www.dreamtheaterforums.org/boards/index.php?topic=53822.msg2549134#msg2549134

[Ben_Jamin]

Did anyone go or is going to any of the shows? Was that all that was played last night?

[Evermind]

I'm going to a show in Moscow, it's on Tuesday. I'll post the setlist. Hopefully what's on setlist.fm right now isn't the full setlist.

[gzarruk]

I'm going to a show in Moscow, it's on Tuesday. I'll post the setlist. Hopefully what's on setlist.fm right now isn't the full setlist.

I saw some comments on the band's FB and Instagram accounts asking what happened yesterday,  because they had a 90 min slot and they only played a 50 min set.

[Evermind]

Our "festival" has two no-name bands from Russia I've never heard of and Dream Theater. I hope they'll be able to play their full set, because they're the only reason I'm there.

[gzarruk]

Setlist for today seems to be slightly different than the one they played in Mexico. According to Setlist.fm they played AIA instead of ANTR and PMU is back as the encore, the rest of the songs are the same as Domination festival.

[Evermind]

Folks from St. Petersburg show said James had some sort of food poisoning before the show and looked like it too. He still powered through the show though, it seems. Hopefully he feels better today. I'm heading out to the show in a few hours. Probably won't be any merch left as I decided to skip both opening bands and arrive just in time for DT, but we'll see.

[Setlist Scotty]

Our "festival" has two no-name bands from Russia I've never heard of and Dream Theater. I hope they'll be able to play their full set, because they're the only reason I'm there.

What are the names of the bands?

[Evermind]

PuzzleWood and Reds'Cool.

[Evermind]

Okay, so honestly, the show was good. No PMU for us and AIA as an encore. The sound was a bit too loud but still pretty clear. JLB sounded alright too.

My only issue is this format is just too short for DT, in my opinion. The show was shorter than 90 minutes I think. I was just getting pumped with ITPOE pt. 1 - TDOE - Lie combo and there comes Pale Blue Dot and then the encore. Could've definitely used more for the price I paid for the ticket.

Also, I don't quite know what the reason is, but the ticket price dropped in half from what it was on the last day before the show. I would guess not enough tickets was sold—the venue was far from packed—but I obviously don't know the true reason for that.

[cramx3]

Probably because it's a festival with only DT.  I don't think they are big enough draw and a festival could probably hold so many more GA tickets that they did a ticket dump to get people inside so they could spend money.  They recently did this for a punk rock festival I went to, and it was the reason I went because tickets dropped so low on the secondary market because they started selling 4 packs for the price of 2 tickets

[TAC]

Do you have to be 12 y/o to go?

[Evermind]

Do you have to be 12 y/o to go?

At least 12 y/o, yeah. It's that weird law in Russia that requires to put age requirements on almost all things. You might be able to see like 3+ or 6+ y/o for some cartoons in the theaters and whatnot.

It's actually curious it's 12+ for DT, usually it's 18+ for metal bands. My first gig was Blind Guardian in 2010 and it was 18+ and I was 17 and fuck I was afraid I won't be admitted.

[cramx3]

Well those under 12 aren't going to be making up a whole lot more of the sales but if its 18+ only than yea I can see that having an impact.

[Evermind]

To be honest, I've never seen those rules enforced at all. It might say 18+ and it would scare dumbasses like me back then in 2010—I missed Sonata Arctica's The Days of Grays tour because of that—but no one actually checks IDs, as far as I noticed.

[Moor]

In my opinion, and given the fact that there is another European leg coming (as far as I know), they should have limited their shows to festivals only.

I do not see any good point with this "not too short not too long format" with supporting acts, and I believe this will affect the attendance.

Personally, I have booked back in Feb or March for the Athens show in the 2nd of July and at that time the tour was announced as SFAM anniversary tour (evening with format). My booking included flight tickets and hotels. Surely, I was not expecting the playing of SFAM in festivals but the way the tour was announced on DT website (dates of the shows listed under a title in Bold "SFAM anniversary tour"), give a strong impression that the shows that will be played in cities that are not part of festivals, such as Russia and Athens, are part of the SFAM tour or at least has the "evening with" format.

If I knew that this would be the case, I would not have booked and would have waited for the 2nd leg.

Anyway, that is the "somehow sad" story of my 600 EUR investment in DT and hope that in the future tours' announcements are more transparent.

PS. The addition of AAL might ease my pain a little; I have started to listen to their material and they are good.

[Evermind]

There was even an interview at one Russian website where Jordan says they intend to play the full SFAM set in Moscow. Maybe that was in reference to the second European leg, I don't know.

[CharlesPL]

Moscow 2019 (Full Сoncert)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bchalGgfsx8

[TAC]

Awesome!!

[gzarruk]

Moscow 2019 (Full Сoncert)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bchalGgfsx8

[SeRoX]

I think James sings pretty amazing despite his food accident before the show.

[Nachtmerrie]

In my opinion, and given the fact that there is another European leg coming (as far as I know), they should have limited their shows to festivals only.

I do not see any good point with this "not too short not too long format" with supporting acts, and I believe this will affect the attendance.

Personally, I have booked back in Feb or March for the Athens show in the 2nd of July and at that time the tour was announced as SFAM anniversary tour (evening with format). My booking included flight tickets and hotels. Surely, I was not expecting the playing of SFAM in festivals but the way the tour was announced on DT website (dates of the shows listed under a title in Bold "SFAM anniversary tour"), give a strong impression that the shows that will be played in cities that are not part of festivals, such as Russia and Athens, are part of the SFAM tour or at least has the "evening with" format.

If I knew that this would be the case, I would not have booked and would have waited for the 2nd leg.

Anyway, that is the "somehow sad" story of my 600 EUR investment in DT and hope that in the future tours' announcements are more transparent.

PS. The addition of AAL might ease my pain a little; I have started to listen to their material and they are good.

Same here:
Bought my tickets for Oberhausen which was sold as a Dream Theater when I decided to go. I've seen the time-schedule yesterday and it turns out to be the 90-minutes show because it is part of some festival with a few bands I've never heard of.
I would have loved to see AAL again but they are not in the package for Oberhausen.

Might be my foul but I would have waited for the next tour if I'd knew this before as SFAM was the reason I was looking forward to this show.

[DreamerTV]

Though I understand why they wouldn't go out with an evening with formula even for non festival (well, real festivals) gigs, this summer run was quite a mess communication wise. Whether were the promotores who chosed to sell it as the same format as the first American leg (lots of this dates were promoted this way, even the one i'll go in a month for which i've spent 72€ just to find out i'm going to waste 5 hours whatching bands I don't know/care for) it has generated a lot of confusion and quite some discontent. Is it going to affect future attendances? I don't know, DT fans are known for their consistency. But yeah, it kinda sucks. 

[nikatapi]

Yeah it sucks, here in greece the promos specifically said about the SFAM set and i'm sure people will be very disappointed when they understand that DT will play for like 90 minutes.

[Moor]

@Bosk, hope the band is aware of this controversy and the discontent of the affected fans.

Yeah it sucks, here in greece the promos specifically said about the SFAM set and i'm sure people will be very disappointed when they understand that DT will play for like 90 minutes.

The good side of my Athens show, is that MP was included in the line-up by the promoters! And he personally intervened 

https://twitter.com/MikePortnoy/status/1138903815493685253

[abydos]

What the hell? They've chosen to do a 90 minute set instead of the entire SFAM. I can't seem to find any solid reason for this and it's a huge disappointment. Especially since the show will also have like 6 support acts. I'm almost reconsidering going. Huge letdown. I absolutely detest supporting acts as a concept.

[Mladen]

I've been chatting with a friend about this today and it's really odd that this wasn't communicated with the venues in a clear way. The band mentioned in some interviews that none of the summer dates will feature SFAM in its entirety, but for some reason, this was not apparent to those that booked the band. I wonder if someone in the management dropped the ball on this one. Do you have an insight into this, bosk?

[nikatapi]

What's certain is that many people are extremely disappointed and the repeating theme is that if people did know the length of the set, wouldn't probably even get a ticket.
Especially people who are travelling to a neighboring country which means their expenses are already going to be high. 

And i would think that the band would consider that they haven't played for many years in some places (it's been 8 years since they came to Greece) and try to customize their sets a bit to make up for it. But i guess that's not the case anymore.

[noxon]

It's unfortunate that some people will go in with expectations to get a 3 hour show and be disappointed. I've tried to communicate with fans that this summer tour would be festival shows only with no SFAM since "forever", but...

[bosk1]

Do you have an insight into this, bosk?

No idea.  What was communicated?  As far as I know, the band had said fairly early on that the summer European dates were going to be festivals and that the SFAM anniversary would be later.  Was something different communicated?

[Mladen]

Apparently, some venues promoted the summer shows as SFAM anniversary. I wonder if the fans were mislead by the promoters or promoters by the band management.

[cramx3]

Do you have an insight into this, bosk?

No idea.  What was communicated?  As far as I know, the band had said fairly early on that the summer European dates were going to be festivals and that the SFAM anniversary would be later.  Was something different communicated?

I thought it was understood as well but that one promoter was using MP's picture so I wouldn't be surprised if the promoters for some of these shows were lazy and locally promoted it incorrectly. 

[Ben_Jamin]

Do you have an insight into this, bosk?

No idea.  What was communicated?  As far as I know, the band had said fairly early on that the summer European dates were going to be festivals and that the SFAM anniversary would be later.  Was something different communicated?

I thought it was understood as well but that one promoter was using MP's picture so I wouldn't be surprised if the promoters for some of these shows were lazy and locally promoted it incorrectly.

I wonder, when promoting the shows, if the promoters used some subtle wording trick to get people to buy tickets. Something like "Dream Theater whom are celebrating the 20th anniversary of SFAM" and that got people to think they'll play it during this current leg.

[JRuless]

For the Oberhausen gig it was for sure promoted as an SFAM tour.
https://www.festivalstalker.de/2019/02/28/dream-theater-distance-over-time-tour/]

`Zuletzt haben Dream Theater noch einige Tourdaten für Deutschland veröffentlicht (Die Tour wird außerdem den 20. Geburtstag von "Metropolis Pt.2: Scenes from a Memory" feiern, indem die Band das gesamte Album aufführen wird)`

I am glad I waited to get tickets asvit is a long drive from my place as the announcement changed over time.

[abydos]

If this is an error that spans multiple countries and multiple promoters, it can't be all them, right? Must be someone on DT's camp that messed up? This is beyond disappointing, still can't get over how bummed out I am.
The promoter here suddenly brought 5 other bands/performers. Might as well just push the DT show early so we can all go home at a reasonable time. At first it was advertised as Dream Theater. Now the posters online say "Dream Festival" with Dream Theater and the other bands.

http://www.ndk.bg/event/dream-theater-7251-1

The show will be lengthy, because along with new tracks, the band is expected to play all the legendary Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes From A Memory 'on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of its release. This really will be an unforgettable evening you do not want to miss!

https://lifestyle.bg/art/dream-theater-otnovo-v-sofiya.html

Organizers warn that the show will be long lasting because, in addition to their new Dream Theater album, all songs from Metropolis Pt have to be played. 2 of 1999 on its 20th anniversary

This is a bit more vague language but i think that's because these are news outlets and the venue's website, but the page of the ogranizer here still states that in certainty.

http://www.radiotangra.com/en/news/read/32753.html

The band will also celebrate 20 years of 'Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes From A Memory' by performing the album in ITS ENTIRETY on the tour! It's going to be a night you won't want to miss!

And this is the new press release by the organizer here - http://www.radiotangra.com/en/news/read/33818.html

Notice the change in poster and heading -  a "special" 90 minute set.

Google translate cos I'm lazy:

Despite the initial expectations that DREAM THEATER, along with several new songs, will be played on this legendary 'Metropolis Pt'. 2 (see Facebook event made by the group itself), their concert agent told us last night (June 11th) that the musicians eventually decided to present a special 90-minute festival program with songs from different moments of their glorious history.