For my money the first Operation: Mindcrime album is the best album ever released by anyone. It’s real perfection. The sequel is a close second to it. So, when I heard that the group was doing a tour to perform both parts in their entirety, I really wanted to make a show. Alas, that wasn’t going to happen, but now I’ve got this killer BluRay to help me enjoy that experience. Musically the performance is great. There are actors doing various roles and it’s extremely theatrical. A lot of times I don’t like that, but in this case it works. The video and audio are both quite good. However, someone got the brilliant idea of putting some lyrics over the footage like some kind of bad karaoke machine at times. I could have lived without that. At least there should have been an option to shut those off. Even with that annoyance, though, this is a killer document of an awesome concert. There’s some cool bonus material, but that’s really just icing on the cake.

This review is available in book format (hardcover and paperback) in Music Street Journal: 2011  Volume 6 at lulu.com/strangesound.