Special report and photo by Mark Gromen

Regardless of how one feels about the Germans' recorded works, they owe it to themselves to witness the band live, where EDGUY frontman Tobias Sammet proves not only minstrel, but court jester as well. In the packed confines of a small club, as was the occasion at Peabodies, on October 17th, all the better. A sweaty, super-charged performance peppered with Sammet's one-liners and self deprecating sense of humor ("After 15 years in professional music, a girl wants to get laid by me?!"), made it a true gem!

The opening 'Mysteria' got teh audience singing right off the bat, which was good for Sammet's initial joke. During 'Sacrifice', he talked about being progressive. Instead of the usual 1-2-3-4 count off, he said, "DREAM THEATER count to 72" and randomly called out non-sequential numbers to get the "competing" halves of the crowd to yell. His take on this staple of audience participation was equally precious; "I'm going to ask you to scream. I'll tell you it's great, then ask the other side." Genius!

'Lavatory Love Machine', 'Tears Of The Mandrake' and 'Super Heroes' followed. Prior to teh keyboard introduced 'Vain Glory Opera' the diminutive Deutch man claimed, "This song we stole from Europe. You remember them, with the pouffy hair? They weren't progressive." A quick walk-off, walk-on encore saw Sammet again at teh mic, intimating the fans would get to hear one more song. The usual groans, followed by, "Actually you'll get to hear more than one song because KAMELOT is going to play a full set." While not everyone understood the joke, just a perfect ending, as they launched into 'King Of Fools'.

A BraveWords.com Photo Gallery can be found here.