Dream Theater ready for takeoff

  • 2014-02-05
  • By TBT staff

STARTING OVER: Each album is a new opportunity for Dream Theater.

VILNIUS - It was long time ago that one of the most titled titans of progressive music – the American band Dream Theater – achieved fame in the eyes of their fans, but after releasing their last album, the Dream Theater guys started praising themselves and saying that this album is their peak. Seems that the organizers of the prestigious Grammy Awards share the same opinion. The latest Dream Theater single, ‘The Enemy Inside,’ has been nominated in the Best Metal Performance category.

Dream Theater - John Petrucci on guitar, John Myung on bass, James LaBrie on vocals, Jordan Rudess on keyboards and continuum, and Mike Mangini on drums - are one of the biggest touring bands in the world, having completed a 14-month tour with 110 shows through 34 different countries from 2011-2012 in support of their eleventh studio album “A Dramatic Turn Of Events.” “I would say we are the musicians of older generation who achieved fame and won recognition working seriously and persistently, by talent, and not by cheap onetime tricks or scandals. We spread our name and music by establishing direct contact with the fans, i. e. performing live concerts, presenting albums. Playing music and being a part of the Dream Theater affords us spreading our wings and taking off,” says John Petrucci, the guitarist of the band.

As the other band member vocalist James LaBrie says jokingly, the guys’ five remains rushing around in a vicious circle and gaining its success in an obsolete way.
“Since the very formation of the band we went on everlasting concert tours through all over the world, and gathered fans around ourselves this way, accustoming them to the music that we performed. Our schedules are tight. We record and release an album, and then we leave for 1-1.5 year’s long concert tour presenting it. Then we have a few months’ leave and once again shut ourselves in the studio. So, we live in such a 2-3 year cycles, which started in 1992 with the release of “Images and Words,” says LaBrie.

Dream Theater is nominated for the Grammy Award for the second time already. This time, the Dream Theater is competing with such bands as Anthrax, Black Sabbath, Killswitch Engage, and Volbeat. The band was nominated in 2011 for the first time. Their piece “On the Back of Angels” competed in the Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance category then.
The new single, as well as others pieces of their nominal album will be performed in the Dream Theater’s concert held for the first time in Lithuania. The band will make a performance for the country’s music lovers on March 2nd, at Siemens Arena in Vilnius.

“I see every new album as an opportunity to start over,” says Petrucci. “To either build or improve upon a direction that has been evolving over time or to completely break new ground. This is the first self-titled album of our career and there is nothing I can think of that makes a statement of musical and creative identity stronger than that. We’ve fully explored all of the elements that make us unique, from the epic and intense to the atmospheric and cinematic. We’re incredibly excited about Dream Theater and can’t wait for everyone to hear it.”

The guys are notorious in the music world for including many new countries to their new concert tour.
“It’s kind of our visiting card. We enlarge our fans’ army and gain the reputation of live-performers in their eyes this way, and that helps building up their loyalty to us,” says LaBrie.

March 2, at Siemens Arena in Vilnius. Tickets: /goto/www.siemens-arena.com/